


Going to the Chapel and We're Gonna get Wasted

by these_dreams_go_on



Category: The 100 (TV), The 100 Series - Kass Morgan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/F, F/M, Gen, M/M, Slow-burn Bellarke, angst-free Bellarke, bellarke sex scene chapter 11
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-06
Updated: 2018-09-08
Packaged: 2019-03-01 00:36:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 36,237
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13283214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/these_dreams_go_on/pseuds/these_dreams_go_on
Summary: When Bellamy receives his invitation to Finn and Gina's wedding, he had no idea that the event would consume his life for the better part of a year, or that it would see most of his friends finding love and committed relationships while trying to calculate the expense of attending the nuptials at Mt Weather.





	1. Goodbye Saturday Morning and Peace of Mind

**Author's Note:**

> Weirdly enough, I think Finn and Gina would have made a decent pairing.

_Mr and Mrs Martin request the pleasure of your company at the marriage of their daughter_

_Gina Leah Martin_

_To_

_Finn Louis Collins_

_Saturday, the Thirtieth of March_

_Two Thousand and Seventeen_

_At Half Past Three in the Afternoon_

_Mt Weather Hotel and Resort_

_Reception to follow._

_Black Tie_

_For further information, please see finnandgina.com_

* * *

 

June 2016

  
Bellamy Blake managed a small smile as he held the intricately decorated wedding invitation in hand.

He and Gina had broken up nearly a year ago and it had been long enough that he could be happy for her.

Even if she was marrying Finn Collins.

Which meant…

Doing a quick calculation, assuming Octavia had also received her wedding invitation that morning, delivered by Fedex at roughly nine am with signature required, that she’d gone back to bed for another hour, woken up properly, actually checked what she’d received, had time to get dressed and create a group chat, this meant he had exactly…

  
Three, two, one…

  
“ _Bellamy!_ ”

  
He sighed as not only his little sister but her shadows, Jasper and Monty, along with Monty’s boyfriend Miller, Harper and Monroe came bursting through his door.

And, there went his Saturday.

  
“Morning O,” he greets, “And O’s assorted backup.”

  
Miller crashed onto his couch and grabbed the throw blanket he’d recently acquired, drawing it up over his body, “I am not here,” he announced, “Nobody talk to me.”

  
He rolls his eyes but his response is interrupted by Octavia snatching his breakfast up,

  
“You can’t eat this!” she announces, “March is only _eleven months_ away.”

“Um…excuse me?” he protests, following her to the kitchen as she- for the first time ever- chose to hand him an apple instead of sugary cereal,

“What does a wedding have to do with my eating habits?”

“Thanks for waiting for me, dicks!” Raven called as she limped into the apartment,

“Really, no need to be compassionate towards the differently abled.”

Octavia scoffed, “Please Raven, you need way less help than my brother.”

Bellamy leaned back against the kitchen counter and looked across his open plan studio to Raven, “Do you have any idea what she’s on about?”

Raven smirked, “Our exes are getting married Blake, yours and mine, and we’re both invited…”

“And going!” Octavia interrupts, stomping across the room with a heavy tread that was difficult for a professional dancer to achieve.

“And going,” Raven echoes, “Which means, we have to be very careful lest we fall into the trope of heartbroken-still-not-over-you-jealous-as-hell exes.”

Bellamy gives himself a moment to take all that in, “Did you not get a plus one?” he asks carefully, glancing to his rsvp card to double-check that he had been allowed to bring a guest.

“Oh, I was,” she assured him, “And I’m gonna be bringing a banging hot date when I find one, but this…” she gestures to the envelope on the table,

“This is not something we can just casually rock up to, this requires the planning of a five-star general.”

“Or…” Harper interjected, “Octavia Blake!”

  
Spinning with the dancer’s grace Bellamy was used to seeing in his little sister, Octavia grinned at Harper and clapped her hands, summoning Monty and Jasper who started unpacking a suitcase, bringing out a laptop and projector which they set up in record time.

Meanwhile, Monroe had shuffled close to him, “I can maybe hold them off for three seconds if you want to run.” She offered and he chuckled,

“Not a chance, Octavia’s between me and my passport…besides, she knows where my grandparents live, I’d never make it there alive.”

Jasper cleared his throat, “Attention delinquents and delinquent associates,” he announces, gesturing to Miller who had his back to the room,

“Welcome to the first meeting of the Fina Wedding attendance planning committee,”

“ _Fina?_ ” Bellamy interrupts,

“Finn and Gina’s ship name,” Harper supplies, “I suggested Ginn, but apparently, that’s too confusing.”

“As opposed to what we’re doing now?” he counters, shouting in protest when Octavia whacks him over the head, “Focus.” she hisses and he glowers at her.  

Jasper was bouncing on the balls of his feet in excitement. “Firstly, I yield the floor to our intelligence expert, Monty Green.”

Monty bent over the laptop, pressing a button and bringing up an image of the wedding invitation on Bellamy’s white feature wall,

“Let’s begin with the stationery,” he commences,

“This my friends, is from Atelier Isabey, a luxury invitation company based on Madison Avenue in New York, this is the Marquise Collection, their classic design inspired by Chantilly lace with a champagne colour palette. The starting price for this is three thousand dollars.”

“Shit.” Miller rolled over and sat up, “For some _paper?!_ ”

Monty eyed his boyfriend, “Did you not hear me say champagne colour palette? This also includes the laser cut sleeve and this wasn’t the standard package, besides the invitation, rsvp card, envelope and the information card, they also paid for these invitations to be specially delivered, requiring signed confirmation and assuming that they’ve invited minimum one hundred people, I’d say this alone set them back five thousand.”

 

Bellamy swore to himself in that moment that he would never get married.

 

Monty allowed them a few moments for that to sink in, “Now, so far we have these invitations, and a location, Mt Weather, which is a ten-hour drive from Arkadia, making this almost a destination wedding.”

“Not to mention it takes place over Easter and Spring Break,” Raven gripes, “So, we’re all going to need to apply for time off pretty much now.”

“We’re also going to need to book our rooms now,” Monty warned, “Because Mt Weather hotel and resort is at the very top of the mountain, inaccessible to cars, with a shuttle bus running up and down twice a day but the only other hotel is ten miles away and a family friendly inn which means it’ll be booked out and definitely not a place where we can stumble back drunk at whatever time this reception ends.”

  
Everyone reached for their phones to start looking up the hotel and Bellamy took the chance to escape to the kitchen and make himself a coffee with half-and-half, ignoring Octavia’s sudden interest in his diet. Growing up, he and his sister had barely been above the poverty line and from the moment he could legally work, he had often had at least two jobs at a time to pay his own way as much as he could. He’d got into college on scholarships and encouraged Octavia to do the same, otherwise they could never have afforded to study. He had graduated summa cum laude and been accepted into post-grad with the department of Ancient History, and between his work as a teaching assistant and part time role at Arkadia Museum, he had a decent enough salary that his bills were on auto-pay and he had savings for the first time in his life.

That being said, he was pretty sure the price for the only hotel atop a mountain where his rich colleagues went on skiing holidays was going to bring up the anxiety of his childhood.

And this theory was confirmed when he heard Monroe swear up a storm for the first time ever.

  
“I’m on army pay-cheque,” she protests, holding her phone at arm’s length, “I can’t afford _that_!”

Harper hummed in agreement, “Okay, you and I and maybe two other people should definitely share a room.”

“Yeah and then some,” Raven griped, “My hospital stay cost less per night.”  
  


Bellamy couldn’t even bring himself to look at the website on his sister’s phone,

  
“You and I can share a room, Reyes,” he offered, “And O, and Monty.”

  
He ignored Jasper’s gasp of outrage that he wasn’t being invited to bunk down with them and was a little offended when Raven snickered,

  
“Oh,” she trailed off,   
  
“We haven’t got to the second part of the planning committee.” she warns and he frowns,

“What?!”

“Ahem,” Jasper climbs onto a chair, waving his arms and receiving a warning glare from Bellamy, climbs back down again, “I am yielding the floor to…myself, the…”

“Idiot?” he supplies helpfully, wincing as Octavia whacks him on the head again,

“Liaison adviser,” he declares and Bellamy is pretty sure that’s not a thing,

“As we all know,” he continues, “Finn Collins broke the heart of our lovely, our extraordinary, our one-of-a-brilliant-kind, Raven Reyes.”

  
He gestures to Raven who flips him the bird.

  
“What did he do?” Miller asks, having only come into their lives as Monty’s boyfriend a month ago.

“Cheated on me ten days into a two-week environment course in Trikru National Park.” She explained and he winced, “Bastard.”

“And,” Jasper cried, “Gina Martin, an otherwise pretty cool chick, ended things with our surrogate father figure Bellamy Augustus Blake, because and I quote “he had too much emotional baggage”.”

“You think my middle name is _Augustus_?” Bellamy queried, “Wrong end of the alphabet buddy.”

“Which is why,” he continues, speaking louder, “For this wedding, it will not be enough to attend looking nice, but everyone must be the most smoking hot versions of ourselves, and yes, this will extend to our dates.”

“I’ve already sent you all the same exercise regime I’m on during my ‘holidays’,” Octavia informs them, “And I already found the best gym that’s closest to all our places, they’re offering us a group booking discount for memberships.”

Bellamy ran a hand through his hair and looked longingly at the book on his coffee table that he had planned to spend his weekend reading,

“Don’t you think you guys are going just a tiny bit overboard?” he suggested, “It’s just a wedding.”

“A wedding for which, conservative estimate, the location and invitations alone have cost Fina twenty-thousand dollars,” Monty argues, “Do you really want to half-ass this?”

  
For the sake of arguing, Bellamy wants to say yes, but Raven cuts right through the conversation and the room, flicking him on the hand as an invitation to follow her.

She leads him to his bedroom and drops down onto his window seat, sighing with relief and he feels guilty that he didn’t make her sit down earlier.

  
“Look,” she murmurs, “I know that you want to take the high road on this, to be the bigger Blake and whatever it is you’re thinking right now. But, consider this from the perspective of the other wedding guests, you and I are the exes, and the ones who were dumped, this already sets us up to be the pity invites and, imagine if we rock up treating this as any other wedding, people are going to be looking at us as the bullets Finn and Gina dodged.”

  
Bellamy doesn’t immediately reply because he’s distracted by something happening on the street below. A delivery to the café across the road.

He remembers when he moved into the apartment building, converted from an old brick factory, back then, the only stores on the street had been pawn shops and porn shops.

It had been unfortunate, but the apartment was a loft, rent-controlled and close to the train that took him straight to the university campus.

The apartment building had quickly been filled and, lucky for him, gentrification had happened after a year or so, the stores below becoming artisan bakeries, a tattoo-parlour, and a café, along with a bookshop due to open in a month, but he still remembered how Gina hadn’t wanted to have her parents over for lunch because they would have been horrified by the location.

Instead, they’d met at a ridiculously pricey restaurant in the business district where Bellamy had been stopped by the police at the corner, questioned extensively by the staff at the reservation desk and then had to field questions from Gina’s father about his ethnicity.

And he remembered the Black Friday where Raven had turned up on his doorstep, still drying her eyes after enduring Thanksgiving with Finn’s Wasp-y relatives in the Hamptons, she’d gone there with optimism that had been crushed after his aunt had threatened to call ICE on her, absolutely certain that the third generation Californian was an illegal immigrant from Mexico.

It was bad enough that Finn and Gina’s parents had been uncomfortable around them because they had grown up poor, that they had had to work hard for the same things that Finn and Gina had taken for granted, but having the parents of the person you loved look at you and always note the colour of your skin…

He still cared for Gina, and he wanted her to have a wonderful wedding and life with the man she loved, but he also didn’t want to spend a long weekend trapped on a mountain with people looking down their noses and quietly thanking their white-washed god that he wasn’t the groom.

He sighed and ran a hand through his hair,

  
“Okay, I’ll wear my contacts for the wedding and go along with whatever crazy schemes my little sister has planned, within reason.” He adds as Raven smirks, “Atta boy.”

“Should we go together?” he suggests, as she pulls herself up and heads back to the main room, “As fake dates?”

  
She runs her eyes over him, lingering on his crotch and he remembers how they’d rebounded rather enthusiastically with each other for a while before swearing to be platonic friends.

  
“Sorry, Blake,” she says, patting his shoulder, “But the exes can’t turn up together, it’ll be sad, we both have to bring dates.”

“Hot dates!” Octavia called and Bellamy glares through the exposed brick wall,

“We get it, O!”

* * *

_Text Message_

_History Nerd: Just got invited to my exes wedding_

_PC: Whatever you do, do not get drunk on tequila and lure her previously considered straight cousin down to the beach for ocean sex before driving the wrong car home._

_History Nerd: That is alarmingly specific advice._

_PC: No, just a general warning, things you shouldn’t do at your exes wedding._

_PC: Not speaking from personal experience at all._

__

* * *

 


	2. Versace, Vanity and Villeroy and Boch

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lots of social media in this chapter

 

June 2016

_Group Chat: Skilled in Science Stuff_

_Sunday 10.05am_

_Raven Reyes: Welp, Octavia now has a boyfriend and a date to the wedding._

_Jasper Jordan: What?! How? It's been one day and she was still single when I saw her eight hours ago._

_Raven Reyes: She’s Octavia Blake, we got to the gym five minutes ago, she changed into workout gear and bam, walked right into a relationship with the hottest guy in the tri-state area._

_Monty Green: That explains the heartbroken wails I hear outside my window, every straight single guy for twenty miles must be crying into their Tinder profile right now._

_Jasper Jordan: But…_

_Jasper Jordan: But…_

_Jasper Jordan: How? Did she use a pickup line? What was her game?_

_Raven Reyes: She’s a Blake, they don’t have game, they just walk into a public area and make eye contact with the hottest person there._

_Monty Green: Remember Spring Break 2015? When we all went to the beach on the Saturday and the two of them met us there, walking along the water’s edge in their swimsuits?_

_Monty Green: I was never a hundred percent certain of my bisexuality until that moment._

_Raven Reyes: We were ALL bisexual in that moment._

_Raven Reyes: Like, everyone on the beach._

_Jasper Jordan: I remember having to almost literally beat frat boys off Octavia with a stick._

_Jasper Jordan: And Bellamy disappearing with three girls at once._

_Jasper Jordan: He had sex with half of Florida that weekend._

_Jasper Jordan: But seriously guys, how do they do this?!_

_Monty Green: Have you seen them? They exist, that’s what they do, that’s all they need to do._

* * *

_Group Chat: Delinquents do a Wedding_

_Tuesday 12:03pm_

_  
Jasper Jordan has added Monty Green, Octavia Blake, Harper McIntyre, Zoe Monroe and Raven Reyes to the group._

_Jasper Jordan: So, according to Cosmo, you need to be in a relationship for at least six months before you’ve reached the point where it’s appropriate to bring your significant other along to a wedding._

_Jasper Jordan: It is now July and if we allow for the time it takes for a new relationship to reach the ‘attending weddings together’ stage but also for the time it takes for a new person to be really accepted into our group, we all need to start looking for dates like…yesterday._

_Jasper Jordan: Including me because somebody thinks it’s okay to break an eternal, unbreakable vow and choose his hoe before his bro._

_Jasper Jordan: *cough* Monty Green *cough*_

_Monty Green: Jasper, we made that vow when we were ten and you’re already invited to the wedding, of course I’m going to bring Nate._

_Jasper: Nate? You’re not even taking Miller but some random named Nate?!_

_Jasper Jordan: Who is this man-slut named Nate?_

_Jasper Jordan: He sounds like a real fuck-boi_

_Jasper Jordan: Honestly Monty, I can’t believe you would do this to me or Miller!_

_Monty Green: …_

_Monty Green: Nate is Miller’s first name._

_Monty Green: Nate Miller._

_Jasper Jordan: Miller is his last name?_

_Harper McIntyre: Oh, now I see why Jasper thought we’d need ten months to integrate a person into our friendship group._

_Raven Reyes: Yeah, but once you’re in, you’re in._

_Raven Reyes: There is no escape._

_Raven Reyes: Even if you didn’t actually date a member of the group._

_Raven Reyes: One minute you’re boning your heartache away with no-strings attached sex, next thing you know you’re on the Emergency Contact list for someone in Iraq, you have a spare key to four different apartments and a monthly academic club with two nerds not even in the same field of science as you._

_Raven Reyes: It’s like being in a cult._

_Octavia Blake: Speaking of mistakes Raven has made, why is my brother not in this group?_

_Jasper Jordan: Bellamy sucks at group chats, he always turns off the notifications and then misses all the important details._

_Jasper Jordan: But I do think we should include the significant others._

_Jasper Jordan has made Monty Green and Octavia Blake administrators of the chat._

_Monty Green has added Nate Miller._

_Octavia Blake has added Lincoln Woods._

_Nate Miller has read these messages._

_Nate Miller: Nope._

_Nate Miller has left the group._

_Lincoln Woods has read these messages_

_Lincoln Woods: You know, I haven’t really earned my place in your group yet, how about we give it a few months and Octavia just fills me in in the meantime?_

_Lincoln Woods has left the group._

_Raven Reyes: Quick Octavia, he’s trying to escape!_

_Octavia Blake has added Lincoln Woods._

_Octavia Blake: Sorry, not sorry, babe._

_Jasper Jordan: So, before we lose track of this thread._

_Lincoln Woods: Before?_

_Raven Reyes: Should have run when you had the chance buddy._

_Jasper Jordan: The following people need to find dates for the wedding. Me, Harper, Monroe and Raven._

_Zoe Monroe: Ah…actually…_

_Harper McIntyre: Me or you?_

_Zoe Monroe: I can if you want?_

_Harper McIntyre: Let me._

_Zoe Monroe: Okay._

_Harper McIntyre: So, guys, Zoe and I have something to tell you…we uh, we kind of realized that what we felt for each other went beyond friends or roommates and we will be attending this wedding together._

_Harper McIntyre: As girlfriends._

_Harper McIntyre: Romantic partners._

_Jasper Jordan: So, you two just bypassed the whole ‘introduce a new victim to the cult’ stage huh?_

_Monty Green: What Jasper means is, we are so happy you two found each other and love and accept you no matter what._

_Jasper Jordan: So, the only people who have to find a date are me and Raven._

_Octavia Blake: And Bellamy._

_Jasper Jordan: Not adding him to the group._

* * *

 

_Text Message_

_History Nerd: My friends have started referring to our group as a cult_

_PC: That’s good, denial benefits nobody_

_History Nerd: I have to find some non-crazy friends_

_PC: Why? Need more victims for your cult?_

_History Nerd: I need a way out_

_PC: Careful, I might be a spy for your sister to check your loyalty._

_PC: Not saying I am._

_PC: But I’m not saying that there isn’t a secret bunker in Polis to imprison you if you ever try to escape your sex cult._

_History Nerd: It’s not a sex cult_

_PC: Denial benefits nobody_

* * *

August 2016

_Group Chat: Delinquents do a Wedding_

_Octavia Blake has added Bellamy Blake to the group._

_Jasper Jordan: Wait, what?!_

_Jasper Jordan: Octavia Marie Blake what did I say about adding Bellamy to a group chat?_

_Octavia Blake: You think my middle name is Marie?!_

_Bellamy Blake has added a picture._

  
Finn Collins in a private message to Bellamy Blake.

_Finn Collins: Hi Bellamy, I just wanted to say thank-you for those card and flowers you sent Gina and I congratulating us on our engagement, it was very mature of you and I’m sure we will treasure them and the wedding present you give us forever._

_Bellamy Blake: No problem, Finn. I’m happy for your both. Did you get my RSVP?_

_Finn Collins: We did._

_Finn Collins: That’s actually what I wanted to talk to you about._

_Finn Collins: I know Gina messaged you saying it didn’t matter whether you brought a date to the wedding or not but to be honest, since Harper and Monroe decided to be together, it’s thrown off the seating plan and we’re already going to have empty places at your table, if you come solo as well, that’s just three wasted seats, plates, and money down the drain._

_Finn Collins: And Gina and I have enough to worry about without having to deal with drama from our exes._

_Bellamy Blake has read this message._

_Bellamy Blake: If it’ll make Gina happy then I’ll bring a date._

 

_Jasper Jordan, Octavia Blake and six others have seen this._

* * *

 

 _Text message_  


_History Nerd: Is it rude to punch someone at a wedding?_

_History Nerd: Asking for a friend_

_PC: Are they in the wedding party?_

_History Nerd: Groom_

_PC: Do they have the skills or strength to put you on your ass?_

_History Nerd: Doubtful_

_PC: Then aim somewhere covered by the suit._

* * *

 

October 2016

“Are you _kidding_ me?!”

  
Bellamy nearly concussed himself as he reared his head up, managing to stop only a second away from connecting with the pipe under the kitchen sink.

His neck protested and he grimaced as he eased his way out, dropping the wrench on the floor as he pushed himself into a sitting position, waiting patiently for his sister to reach him.

  
“This is _insane_!” she shouts and he places her in his living room,

“In here, O.” he calls back and she sweeps into his view with an expression of outrage that makes her look like an avenging angel.

“Where’s your laptop?” she demands and he shrugs,

“Desk?”

She storms out and Lincoln appears in her wake, holding out a hand to Bellamy to help him to his feet, “Leak?” he asks, nodding to the pipes and he returned the nod,

“Not anymore.”

  
Bellamy hadn’t been thrilled when Octavia had brought Lincoln over to meet him, especially when they’d discussed moving in together after having only known each other for a month or so, but despite being older than him, and with a shaved head and tattoos, Lincoln Woods, professional photographer and fitness enthusiast, was a good man.

And clearly utterly devoted to Octavia.

Octavia is tapping away at his laptop and connects it to the projector and the white screen that Lincoln had brought over and helped install, thinking they were using it for movie nights.

That he hadn’t run away screaming when Jasper explained what they were really using it for suggested he was either very in love with Octavia, super Zen or smoked more weed than Jasper and Monty combined.

  
“Look at this!” Octavia ordered, pointing at the screen and the two men sat on the couch, looking at a website.

“Why are you on the museum’s royal dining exhibition page?” Bellamy asks, frowning as he took off his glasses to clean them,

“I’m not!” his sister snapped, “This is Finn and Gina’s gift registry.”

  
Bellamy cleaned his glasses again, and then got up to draw the blinds so he could definitely see the screen clearly.

  
“Those numbers at the bottom aren’t the item-codes, are they?” he asked, hopefully,

“Nope,” Octavia answered, “They aren’t.”

“I didn’t even know Versace made plates,” Lincoln commented, “Or that Vera Wang designed drinking glasses.”

“Did you know that your _pie server_ needs to be Villeroy and Boch?” Octavia offers sarcastically, “Or that you need a _sterling silver candlestick_?”

“None of these match,” Lincoln points out, “It’d look horrible on a table.”

  
But it would be the most couture table in the zip code.

  
“O,” Bellamy shuffles over to join her at his laptop, “What the least expensive thing on here?”

Octavia scrolled down, “That hasn’t already been bought?” she mutters, “The rose dinner set.”

Bellamy winces at the three-figure price, “Okay, can we go in as a group and buy it? It’s a twenty-four-piece set, it’d make sense for it to be a group present.”

Octavia grumbles, but types a quick message on her phone and reserves the set on the site.

  
“This is ridiculous,” she sulks and Bellamy hums in agreement.

  
So far, between the present, and the hotel rooms, this wedding was already costing them a few hundred dollars.

And they hadn’t even got their outfits yet.

* * *

 

_Text message_

_History Nerd: Did you know Versace did homewares?_

_PC: Unfortunately, yes_

_PC: I was gifted the Vanity set, which is exactly what it sounds like._

_PC: And from someone I see on the regular._

_PC: So, I can’t regift it, can’t put it into storage, can’t pretend to take ecstasy and smash it into a million pieces…_

_History Nerd: Life is hard._

_PC: Shopping for the wedding?_

_History Nerd: My friends and I are getting them a table set._

_History Nerd: Because while we’re okay with attending the wedding of ex-friends and ex-partners, we’re not okay with it costing us four figures a piece._

_PC: At least the resort looks nice._

_PC: And I’ve heard Mt Weather is lovely in the spring._

* * *

November 2016

_Text Message_

_History Nerd: Happy Pie Day_

_PC: Happy Not in America so it’s a weirdly a regular day for me_

_PC: day_

_History Nerd: You going to be in America anytime in the future?_

_PC: Yeah._

_PC: Turns out, I have the last week of March and then all of April off._

_History Nerd: I thought you were working through til July_

_PC: I was meant to be but I suddenly got a short holiday._

_History Nerd: That’ll be nice_

* * *

 

“You’re an idiot!”

“I’m not the one standing on a table, O!”

  
Octavia twisted away from him, stepping around or over the plates and centrepiece to avoid his hands.

When he reached for her, she kicked at him before stretching up onto her toes in clear warning and he backed off immediately, knowing that she was in the wrong shoes to be pulling off pointe technique without injury.

In triumph, she looked to Lincoln, who held out his hands, easily catching her when she jumped down. She spun around, wrapping his arms over her shoulders and nestling against his chest.

  
“So, as I was saying,” she continued, “My brother is an idiot.”

  
The other occupants at the table didn’t even bother to try and defend him, then again, they also hadn’t reacted when Octavia had grabbed his phone and they’d chased each other around the room before she’d scarpered for higher ground.

Something about the holidays always brought the more immature parts of the Blake siblings to the surface.

Annoyed at the lack of reaction, Octavia held the phone up so Lincoln could see the screen, scrolling up and down as he quickly read the messages.

  
“I wouldn’t say Bellamy is an idiot,” he decided, cautiously, “Though I definitely think this person is angling for an invitation to the wedding.”

Bellamy rolled his eyes, “She isn’t, she’s just making conversation, we’re just friends.”

“Oh, so she just suddenly happened to get time off in March and April, and developed an interest in Mt Weather spring activities?” his sister challenged.

Lincoln offered him a crooked smile, “And I said almost the exact same things to Octavia when we were ‘just friends’.”

Raven snorted into her wine glass, “I’m sorry, when were you two _‘just friends’_? Because I was there when you met and pretty much the first thing you two did after exchanging names was delete your dating apps.”

Octavia tilts her head back as Lincoln smiles into her hair, “I didn’t say we were friends for long.” He murmurs.

“Back to my idiot brother,” Octavia says, “This girl, what’s her name?”

He shakes his head, “Nope, not giving you a single detail about her, I’m not going to have any of you stalk her social media or try and track her down.”

“But we can’t bring her into the cult unless we know her name and social security number.” Jasper argued, barely visible from behind his plate of mashed potato.

“Exactly,” Bellamy countered, “It’s too late for me, but I can save other people.”

  
Miller stood up to refill the water jug and on the way back, swiped Bellamy’s phone from Octavia’s hand, by the time Bellamy has managed to snatch it back, he’s already getting the reply.

* * *

 

_Text message_

_History Nerd: I know this is kind of late notice but do you want to come to the wedding with me?_

_PC: I’d love to!_

* * *

 

“You’re welcome.” Miller announces as he shifts his plate for Monty to help himself to his food.

Jasper groans, “Now the only ones’ left are me and Raven.”

* * *

 

December 2016

_Group Chat: Delinquents do a Wedding_

_Bellamy Blake has added a picture_

  
Finn Collins in a private message to Bellamy Blake

_Finn Collins: Hi Bellamy, hope you’re well, I just need to know the name of the plus one you’re bringing to the wedding._

_Finn Collins: We’re having our place settings custom made._

_Bellamy Blake: Man, it must suck having to chase everyone up for names._

_Finn Collins: Well, most people knew who they were bringing when they RSVP’d, they didn’t have to go out and find dates._

_Bellamy Blake: Do you need Octavia’s plus one as well?_

_Finn Collins: I think Gina already has hers._

_Finn Collins: But if you happen to know Raven’s, that’d be great._

_Bellamy Blake: My date is Clarke Griffin._

_Finn Collins: Oh._

_Finn Collins: I didn’t realise you were gay._

_Bellamy Blake: One- bi. Two- Clarke is a girl._

_Finn Collins: Did she used to be a guy with a name like Clarke?_

_Bellamy Blake: Nope._

_Finn Collins: Are you sure?_

_Bellamy Blake: Tell Gina I said hi._

 

_Nate Miller, Lincoln Woods and six others have seen this._

_Nate Miller: Wow, this dude is an asshole._

_Monty Green: Custom made place settings? That’s gonna set them back another three figures._

_Raven Reyes: Right, I’m gonna have to suck it up and do something extremely stupid._

* * *

 

December 2016

_Group Chat: Delinquents do a Wedding._

_Jasper Jordan has added Kyle Wick to the group._

_Kyle Wick: Hey everyone!_

_Kyle Wick: Huh, how far back do these messages go?_

_Lincoln Woods: Trust me, don’t read them._

_Kyle Wick: Why?_

_Kyle Wick: Oh._

_Kyle Wick has left the group._

_Raven Reyes: Don’t worry, he’ll be back._

* * *

 

December 2016

_Group Chat: Delinquents do a Wedding._

_Jasper Jordan: Raven, your initiate just beat me at foosball, break up with him immediately._

_Raven Reyes: Nah, he looks good in a tux, I’ll keep him until April 1 st._

_Kyle Wick: Uh…did you guys forget that I’m in this chat?_

_Octavia Blake: Nope, we’re aware. Welcome to the Christmas party by the way._

_Kyle Wick: Thanks, even though you ignored me when I said hi to you in person._

_Octavia Blake: Raven, your initiate is being mouthy._

_Raven Reyes: Yeah, he does that._

_Kyle Wick: Right, I’m gonna go hang with the only two sane people here._

_Kyle Wick: And maybe start a support group for the romantic partners of you, assholes._

_Monty Green: I know where you can print t-shirts._

_Jasper Jordan: Hey where is Bellamy? Is he hiding from all the mistletoe?_

_Raven Reyes: Judging from the amount of attention even Murphy is getting, I’d say he’s not here._

_Nate Miller: He’s at another event_

_Jasper Jordan: Monty, why is your boyfriend lying to us?_

_Monty Green: He’s not, Bellamy told us he was busy tonight, remember?_

_Jasper Jordan: Lies. Critiquing documentaries doesn’t count as ‘busy’._

_Octavia Blake: He’s with the love of his life_

_Harper McIntyre: Herodotus?_

_Bellamy Blake: Harper, you’re my favourite. Screw the rest of you, I’m at the work Christmas party._

_Octavia Blake: With the love of your life_

_Raven Reyes: How long’s Caligula hanging around Arkadia for?_

_Bellamy Blake: I think you’ve all forgotten whose apartment you’re hoping to spend Christmas day in._

_Raven Reyes: I think you’ve forgotten that six of us have keys to your apartment and two of us know how to pick locks._

_Nate Miller: Three_

_Monty Green: Really?_

_Nate Miller: Yeah, my dad’s a cop._

_Bellamy Blake: Okay, so before I turn my phone off, I’m at the work Christmas party at Alpha Station. Bye_

_Octavia Blake: Bellamy loves Professor Kane!_

_Octavia Blake: Bell…_

_Octavia Blake: Dammit, didn’t make it in time_

_Zoe Monroe: Who’s Professor Kane?_

_Octavia Blake: Bellamy’s boss and BFF, seriously, it’s sad how much time they spend talking about history and watching documentaries together._

_Lincoln Woods: Isn’t that literally your brother’s job?_

_Octavia Blake: Yeah but this is outside of office hours and they go to museums together on the weekend._

_Harper McIntyre: Hot damn, check out his staff page on Ark U. I’d be hanging with my boss on the weekend too if he looked like that._

_Raven Reyes: You know, I think I’m in the wrong field. Is he single?_

_Octavia Blake: He was engaged last I checked._

_Kyle Wick: Still in this chat, Reyes._

_Raven Reyes: Still aware, Wick._

* * *

_Text message_

_History Nerd: Happy Christmas!_

_PC: Happy Christmas!_

_PC: Video chat later?_

_History Nerd: Sure_

* * *

 

Lincoln Woods in a private message to Raven Reyes:

_Lincoln Woods: Hey, can you help me distract Octavia?_

_Lincoln Woods: I’m pretty certain Bellamy is sexting on the fire escape and I don’t want it to be a whole thing._

_Raven Reyes: What’s in it for me?_

_Lincoln Woods: Buy you a pack of your favourite drink?_

_Raven Reyes: Deal._

* * *

 

January 2017

  
Bellamy winced as Jasper once again began a screeching rendition of ‘All by myself’ and checked his watch.

Two hours and thirty minutes into the new year and he was stuck trying to round up his people from Dropship, which was packed to the metal rafters and doors with party goers.

Grimacing as a random woman collided with him, laughing sloppily as she apologised, her dress splattered with drink, he moved through the crowd, looking for familiar faces.

Lincoln, he could see on the dancefloor, his back facing him but from the way he was moving, he was either dancing with Octavia or having an affair in the middle of their regular haunt where everyone knew them as a couple.

Assuming the former, he searched for Harper and Monroe next, finding them in the courtyard, Monroe chain smoking and Harper bravely enduring the cold as she chatted with her girlfriend’s army pals.

Miller was chilling on the second floor, somehow having made his way into the VIP section and Monty was next to him, his head on his shoulder, either dozing or stoned senseless.

Descending the steps, he scans the crowd, not even trying to look for Raven’s brunette hair in the sea of women but searching for Wick’s blonde head instead.

He sees him slouched over the bar and claps him on the back as he approached.

  
“Switch to water.” he orders in passing, nodding to the bartender and being silently handed his own free bottle.

“I’ve been sobering up since midnight,” Wick says, holding up a large glass filled with ice,

“Happy fucking New Year.”

Bellamy frowns, “You okay?”

  
Like Miller, Kyle had quickly found his place in their group, happy to join them whenever they went out or chill on a couch for hours. He listened when Bellamy talked about history, played video games with Jasper and Monty and watched sports with Miller. His relationship with Raven seemed based in bickering and sexual tension, but Bellamy had noticed that a lot of the time, the bickering resulted in full-blown shouting matches.

  
“I can’t leave her if she pushes me away first,” Wick intones, chewing on an ice cube,

“And she’s putting a lot of effort into making sure I’m gone the second this wedding is over.”

He winces, “Look Raven, she’s been through a lot…”

Wick raises his eyebrows. “I know man, I was there for most of it. I drove her home from the hospital, I made the brace she wears with my own two hands. I covered for her when the stuff with Finn had her crying in the work bathroom.”

Bellamy pressed his lips together, “Sorry, I didn’t know that.”

He shrugged, “Why would you? I didn’t exist for you guys until she needed me to go along to this wedding.”

  
Bellamy doesn’t know how to respond to that, so he glances around, finally spotting Raven dancing with some women he doesn’t know, laughing and flicking her hair but he can see the way her expression is tight.

She’s in pain.

She’ll have to wear the brace for the next few days.

  
“Help me get everyone home?” he asks Wick who checks his phone, “It’s still early, you got somewhere to be?”

  
He looks down at his shoes and decides that the guy needs a show of faith right now,

  
“I got a girl at home.” he explains,

Wick smacks his hands on the bar, “Right, you grab Raven, your sister and Lincoln, I’ll round up the rest, meet out front in…” he pauses, considering, “Ten minutes.”

Bellamy grins, “You’re the best.”

  
With Wick helping him, he manages to shepherd everyone to the curb outside the bar, where Wick grabs their phones, sets up their Ubers and makes sure they have everything they arrived with.

Raven is leaning on Bellamy, trying to take as much weight off her leg as possible and when her car arrives, she almost falls into the backseat,

  
“Today, Wick!” she shouts after greeting the driver and helping herself to a bottle of water.

  
Wick goes to the driver’s side window, quietly asks him to make sure Raven gets into her apartment before leaving and then closes the passenger door, turning away as it slips onto the road.

  
Bellamy stares him down as he shrugs, “I don’t have the energy to be pushed away again tonight,” he mutters, “I’ll head over tomorrow.”

Bellamy shares an Uber with Harper and Monroe, who are adorably frisky in the backseat while he and the driver make awkward conversation and he’s last home if the check-in messages he gets from the group chat they set up are anything to go by.

 

There’s a lamp on in his living room and he toes off his shoes, heading to the kitchen counter where a glass of water and two aspirin are waiting for him, along with a ridiculously ornately calligraphed note telling him to ‘Drink me’

He thinks he’s being quiet when he slips into his bedroom, but there’s still a rustle in his white sheets and blankets and a raspy, ‘Hi’ alerting him that he woke her up.

“Sorry,” he whispers but she shrugs, “S’okay,” she yawns, “Happy new year.”

  
He grins, pulling off his shirt and pants and swaying on his feet as he contemplates pulling on his pyjama pants.

He should probably shower, he probably reeks of sweat, smoke and spilled liquor but the amount of effort is beyond him right now, so he flops onto the bed and groans.

  
Gentle fingers card his hair and nearly lull him to sleep, “How was it?” she asks, and he groans again as he shifts until his head hits a pillow,

“Like every new year’s celebration ever,” he says, “Too much booze, too many drugs and too high an expectation.”

She hums and sits up to tug the duvet down until she can get it over his body, “I’m sorry I didn’t make it out with you,” she apologises, “I’m just so tired.”

Bellamy rolls over and gives her a tired grin, “The only thing you missed was Jasper shouting every ode to single-life ever sung.”

“Still,” she allows, “I should really meet your friends.”

He can’t shrug in his position but lifts a shoulder anyway. “You’ll meet them at the wedding.”

  
She shuffles over until they’re curled together and looks up at him, eyes filled with sweet affection,

  
“Happy New Year, Bellamy Blake.”

“Happy New Year, Clarke Griffin.”

 

* * *

 


	3. Colour me offended

February 2017

_Group Chat: Delinquents do a Wedding_

_Lincoln Woods: Guess who just got contacted about working a wedding in March?_

_Octavia Blake: Nope, nuh uh, you’re coming to this wedding Lincoln. It’s a little over a month away and you’ve already got the suit._

_Bellamy Blake: Pretty sure he wouldn’t be cancelling on you over group chat, O._

_Monty Green: Wait…_

_Monty Green: They don’t have the photographer booked yet????_

_Monty Green: I thought this was something you booked around the same time as the florist._

_Lincoln Woods: It is if you’re smart about it. I’m already booked for the Governor’s son’s wedding in November._

_Lincoln Woods: But from what I was able to get from Mr Martin and through the grapevine, Mr and Mrs Collins didn’t meet Diana Sydney’s requirements in time and she booked for a kid’s birthday party instead._

_Raven Reyes: Seriously? Who hires a professional photographer for a kid’s party?!_

_Nate Miller: Idiots with lots of money_

_Lincoln Woods: Which describes most of my clientele._

_Lincoln Woods: I explained to Mr Martin that I couldn’t work the wedding because I was attending as a guest._

_Lincoln Woods: He was actually kind of rude so I referred him on to Luna La Mer._

_Lincoln Woods: She’s a celebrity photographer who won’t even take a job for less than four figures._

_Lincoln Woods: And I’m pretty sure she’s touring with Halsey in March._

_Octavia Blake: Hang on, I just got a friend request from Finn._

_Octavia Blake: Weird._

_Octavia Blake: Should I friend him?_

_Monty Green: You weren’t friends with him before?_

_Octavia Blake: Are you kidding me? I defriended him the second he broke up with Raven._

_Octavia Blake: Did you not?!_

_Jasper Jordan: Hello friends, I’m getting messaged by Finn, asking me to pass on a message to our esteemed goddess, Octavia Major._

_Bellamy Blake: Hey, you got the reference right!_

_Lincoln Woods: You should totally name your future daughter Octavia so we can call her Octavia Minor._

_Jasper Jordan has added a picture to this group._

 

Finn Collins in a private message to Jasper Jordan

_Finn Collins: Hi Jasper, I tried to contact Octavia but apparently, we’re not friends on Facebook anymore, which is weird, but I guess she thought it was necessary._

_Jasper Jordan: What can I do for you, man?_

_Finn Collins: I heard that Octavia is dating Lincoln Woods?_

_Finn Collins: He’s a professional photographer._

_Jasper Jordan: Oh yeah, Linc’s cool, he and O are really happy together._

_Finn Collins: Oh, so they’re actually serious? This isn’t just one of her little flings?_

_Jasper Jordan: Well, they’re moving in together so I hope not._

_Finn Collins: Huh, Octavia really has grown up since I last saw her._

_Jasper Jordan: What can I do you for, my man?_

_Finn Collins: Well, our other photographer bailed on us, and apparently Lincoln Woods is the best photographer in Arkadia. My in-laws tried to book him for our wedding but he refused, claiming that because he’s a ‘guest’ he can’t work the event._

_Finn Collins: Because for some reason, he can’t take photos while drinking our champagne._

_Jasper Jordan: Man, that sucks._

_Finn Collins: I was hoping you could give me Octavia’s phone number or email address so I could come up with a solution? This wedding needs to be perfect and we can’t have some second-rate photographer._

_Jasper Jordan: Octavia made me and Monty swear never to give her contact details to dudes without checking with her first, so I’ll pass on the message and get back to you._

_Jasper Jordan: Shame you didn’t book him earlier._

_Finn Collins: My parents didn’t realise he was an award-winning photographer, they googled him and yeah, he’s done some good work, but they didn’t want a guy with shaved head and tattoos at the wedding. They figured it would look unprofessional._

_Jasper Jordan: huh…_

_Jasper Jordan: Tell Gina I said hi._

 

_Jasper Jordan, Raven Reyes and three others have seen this picture_

_Bellamy Blake: So…_

_Bellamy Blake: I see ‘Tell Gina I said hi’ has become our group thing now._

_Monty Green: Not many people could make that five-worded sentiment an insult. I’m glad that’s our thing._

_Octavia Blake: Jasper, do not give Finn my contact details, I will smack him down with a violent written response that I really don’t want the police to be able to use against me at any point in the future._

_Lincoln Woods: There’s actually quite a few reasons why I can’t attend an event as both a photographer and a guest. One of those being, that I don’t have time to eat and drink while working._

_Lincoln Woods: And Mr Martin seemed to think that I would be paying for my own accommodation while I was there._

_Octavia Blake: You don’t need to defend your decision, babe._

_Lincoln Woods: And I cover up my tattoos when I work high-end events._

_Lincoln Woods: Or kid’s parties._

_Lincoln Woods: Depends on the parents and kids._

_Raven Reyes: Think Lincoln is hurt, Octavia, give him a kiss from all of us._

_Bellamy Blake: Except me. Give him a fist bump from me._

_Jasper Jordan: Make my kiss tongue._

_Octavia Blake: Little tongue or slutty tongue?_

_Lincoln Woods: How about neither?_

_Jasper Jordan: Slutty tongue_

_Octavia Blake: On it._

_Lincoln Woods: Think I might go hiking in Trikru National Park for a few days._

_Bellamy Blake: I need some normal friends._

* * *

 

_Text Message_

_PC: This is a long shot, but you wouldn’t happen to know what colour the bridesmaids are wearing would you?_

_History Nerd: I could maybe find out?_

_PC: Thanks, I do not want to rock up wearing the same colour._

_History Nerd: Actually, I should find out for my girls as well._

* * *

 

“Um…hello?” the female voice filtered through the speaker, “Roma Bragg speaking.”

Bellamy blinked at the imperious tone and wondered if she had deleted his number,

“Hey, Roma,” he greeted, “It’s Bellamy.”

A pause, just a bit too long and then he hears a click.

“Bellamy Blake,” she says and he thinks her voice sounds far away enough that he’s been put on speaker. “It’s been awhile.”

That it had.

Actually, she’d stopped speaking to him when he’d ended their casual fling to pursue a relationship with Gina. Somehow, the two of them had become friends after they’d run into her at Dropship.

  
“It has,” he agrees, “How have you been?”

  
He hears hurried whispers and waits for them to finish.

  
“Busy,” she snaps, “I’m one of Gina’s bridesmaids.”

  
He hums and glances at the hanging wall plant next to his window. Lincoln had gifted it to him for Christmas and Bellamy loved having indoor plants, even if he was frequently worried about killing them.

  
“That’s kind of why I’m calling you,” he admits, “My date wants to know what colour the bridesmaids are wearing so she knows what to avoid.”

  
Roma’s laugh is cruelly condescending.

  
“She won’t have anything like what we’re wearing,” she informs him, “Our dresses are being custom-made by a designer, you can’t get anything like them from Forever Twenty-One or H&M…or an op-shop.”

  
Bellamy hadn’t needed the reminder of why he’d never dated Roma, or even slept with her exclusively, but it did make him appreciate Clarke a lot more.

  
“That’s nice for you,” he replies, heavy on the sarcasm, “If I could just get a colour?”

Roma sniffs, “Where’d you even find your ‘date’ anyway?” she asks, her voice dropping in and out as he guesses that she’s moving the phone to make air-quotes for her audience,

“With a name like Clarke, I assume she’s a hipster or a tranny?”

“Oh, for the love of…”

  
Before he can lose his temper, there’s a scuffle on the other end and protests followed by the sound of footsteps on wooden floorboards,

  
“Hi Bellamy.”

“Gina,” he responds, “Uh…hi, I didn’t realise you were with Roma.”

She sighs, “Dress fitting number three hundred and six,” she explains, “Turns out, you need to have your measurements taken more times than you can count before the final fitting a few weeks prior to the big day.”

He makes a sympathetic noise, “Are you excited?” he asks, “Getting close now.”

She chuckles, “More like exhausted, is it sad that the thing I’m looking forward to most on the honeymoon is sleeping?”

He laughs, “Maybe don’t mention that to Finn.”

She clicks her tongue, “Good call.”

“So,” he drawls, “Um, I was really just after the colour of the bridesmaid dresses.”

“Oh yeah,” she says, “Okay, the official colour is long and French, but unofficially, they’re cream, so, you know, as long as your date doesn’t turn up to my wedding wearing any shade of white, we should be good.”

He grins, “How about, if any guest not in the party turns up wearing white, I’ll pour red wine on them?”

She laughs, “I’d appreciate that, thanks.”

  
He wishes her well and ends the call, shooting a quick text to Clarke who responds with a simple thank-you. He figures that Octavia, Raven, Harper and Zoe knew not to wear any shade of white or black to the wedding but he did message his sister giving her a quick recap of his conversation with Roma.

He wonders if his former hook-up was nicer when she wasn’t around him or if Gina’s friendly nature had just won her over. Either way, even though this wedding was setting him back more money than he was completely comfortable spending, he did hope that Gina enjoyed the day.

* * *

 

_Text Message_

_History Nerd: Happy Worst Day of the Year for Singles Day_

_PC: Happy Hallmark Just Made Millions Day_

_PC: We still on for skype later?_

_History Nerd: Depends on what you’ll be wearing._

_PC: Something red and sexy until you’ve finished ranting about St Valentine as a historical figure and how inappropriate it is to commemorate this day to him._

_PC: Then I’ll probably be wearing nothing at all._

_History Nerd: You’ve factored my history rant into our romantic skype session?_

_PC: Are you kidding me?_

_PC: Hearing you talk history gets me halfway there._

_History Nerd: I might be in love with you._

_PC: Good._

_PC: Because I might be in love with you too._

_PC: Provided you’re shirtless during the St Valentine rant._

* * *

 

March 2017

_Group Chat: Delinquents do a Wedding._

_Octavia Blake: Hey Everyone, guess whose boyfriend ditched her._

_Bellamy Blake: If Lincoln ditched you, who are you texting heart emojis to right now?_

_Octavia Blake: …_

_Octavia Blake: Are you in my apartment?_

_Bellamy Blake: Whatever you do, DON’T TURN AROUND!!!_

_Nate Miller: I feel as though this warrants a call to an authority._

_Nate Miller: Like, maybe not the police but definitely some official body._

_Kyle Wick: You know they closed the psych ward of the local hospital, right?_

_Nate Miller: I heard that, yeah._

_Monty Green: So where did all the mental patients go?_

_Raven Reyes: Well, we know at least one of them is in Octavia’s apartment._

_Lincoln Woods: Bellamy, please don’t chop up my girlfriend with an axe._

_Octavia Blake: Okay, I have checked every room and he’s not here._

_Bellamy Blake: Nah, I just got one of your messages to Lincoln earlier._

_Octavia Blake: …_

_Octavia Blake: Um…which message was that exactly?_

_Bellamy Blake: …_

_Bellamy Blake: Why does it matter?_

_Octavia Blake: …_

_Octavia Blake: Was there a photo attachment?_

_Bellamy Blake: Octavia Helene Blake._

_Bellamy Blake: What kind of photos are you sending your boyfriend that you don’t want your brother to see?_

_Monty Blake: Your middle name is Helene?_

_Harper McIntyre: I feel as though we should end this conversation before someone starts wielding an axe._

_Kyle Wick: Why’d you ditch your girlfriend, Lincoln?_

_Lincoln Woods: I didn’t ditch her, I just got a last-minute job in Delfi and it’ll be easier if I meet you all at Mt Weather instead of flying back to Arkadia and then driving up with you guys._

_Lincoln Woods: Actually, I’ll probably get there before you, depending on what time you leave on Friday morning._

_Kyle Wick: Considering the drive time, I assume we’ll pretty much be leaving Thursday night._

_Octavia Blake: Hey Lincoln, quick question, how many photos have you got from me today?_

_Lincoln Woods: …_

_Lincoln Woods: Five._

_Octavia Blake: Oh. Thank God!_

_Octavia Blake: Bang on the door as much as you want Bell, I’m not letting you in._

_Raven Reyes: So, assuming that Bellamy and Octavia don’t go out in a murder-suicide, how should we organize the cars?_

_Jasper Jordan: I’m not going._

_Monty Green: I’ve price-checked all the local rental places. We can either get two five seaters or one minibus._

_Zoe Monroe: Any idea what the state of the roads on the mountain are?_

_Monty Green: Not yet. Give me five minutes._

_Jasper Jordan: I’m not going_

_Zoe Monroe: Because I’m good to drive either way but if the roads are tight or bad, a car would be easier to navigate than a bus none of us are used to driving._

_Monty Green: Just got a picture of the roads and I’ll book two cars now._

_Harper McIntyre: I assume we’re all good to drive?_

_Raven Reyes: If this is going to be done in shifts I’ll be on first._

_Raven Reyes: Unless we all want to see what happens when I lose mobility in my leg while driving on a highway._

_Kyle Wick: I could drive for us both?_

_Raven Reyes: Assuming we’ll be in the same car, huh?_

_Kyle Wick: Why wouldn’t we be?_

_Bellamy Blake: Are we splitting the cars by gender?_

_Bellamy Blake: Because I was planning on being in whichever car doesn’t have Jasper’s mix-tape._

_Jasper Jordan: Me and my single ass are not going._

* * *

 

“I’m not going!”

  
Bellamy Blake wonders how loud Jasper must be talking that he can hear him over the spray of water. Stepping out of the shower, he dries himself off quickly with a towel and wipes down the mirror.

It’s habit to shave every time he showers, but it’s nine-thirty on Thursday night, he’s had a long day at work and he’s about to be in a car for ten hours with people who’ve seen him when he’s had the flu.

So, he throws on the t-shirt and jeans he’d brought into the bathroom with him and shuffles into the living room, still towelling off his hair, 

  
“Shower’s free.” he calls and Miller pats him on the shoulder as he goes past.

  
Monty and Miller had picked up the rental cars that afternoon, and they were now parked out the front of Bellamy’s building, fuelled and ready for the ten-hour trek ahead of them.

His friends were still getting ready.

Their suitcases were packed, but they were all currently strewn around Bellamy’s apartment, lazing on his couch or his bed, killing time until midnight when they’d decided to set off.

He’d volunteered his apartment and his shower, although his fridge was also getting ample use as his sister tried to get everyone to eat one last healthy meal before the inevitable junk food pit stops they had on the ride.

Personally, Bellamy thinks two days before the wedding is too late to be starting a diet, but he’s not about to fight with his sister before a ten-hour drive.

Wick is in the kitchen with her, sitting on the counter as he rubs his face,

  
“Long day?” Bellamy asks, hands on his sister’s shoulders as he moves her out of the way, reaching into the fridge for the orange juice.

“Long day at work,” he answers, but his voice is tight and Bellamy notices that Raven is lying on the couch deliberately not looking at them.

“But nothing a large coffee and five hours of the Proclaimers 500 miles on repeat won’t fix.”

Octavia laughs, “Oh man, you are not going in my car.”

“Or mine.” Raven calls from the couch and there’s a tick in his jaw as he visibly swallows his anger.

  
Bellamy tries to be casual as he wanders over to the window and looks out,

  
“Hey, Raven, did you give the cars a look over, yet?” he asks, “Because when the clock strikes midnight, I want us to be driving, not freezing our asses off on the curb while you fiddle with the engine.”

Raven sighs, “I was going to shower and eat first, but fine, I’ll do it now!”

  
Bellamy slips on his shoes and follows her as she stomps downstairs.

  
“If these cars aren’t in decent condition, you can bet your ass I’m going to be calling the company,” she declared as she popped the hood of the first car, taking her miniature flashlight from her pocket, “And if we have so much as a stall on the road, I’m gonna set them on fire.”

Bellamy hummed and nodded, “That before or after you drive Wick away?”

Raven froze but kept her eyes on the engine, “Wick’s fine,” she mutters, “He’s a big boy.”

“There’s only so much you can push someone away before they don’t come back,” Bellamy says, “And Wick’s come back more than anyone else would.”

  
Raven’s chuckle is almost cold as she moves to the driver’s side to check the mileage,

  
“Did he ask you to talk to me? Couldn’t face me himself?”

“No,” Bellamy tells her, “We’re having this conversation because I want you to be happy.”

“Happy,” she echoes, “You think I need to be in a relationship to be happy? You think my relationship isn’t happy because we fight? Not everyone can be like your sister and Lincoln.”

“I think you’re deflecting,” he argues, “I think Finn was your first love and relationship and you’re afraid to be hurt again.”

“Screw you!” she snaps, “What do you even know about relationships?! Your last real one was Gina, who left you because of you have childhood damage and an obsessive need to prioritize Octavia over everything else. And your current relationship? Half of us don’t even think this Clarke is even real and the other half are pretty certain she’s catfishing you.”

Bellamy crosses his arms and raises an eyebrow, “You want this to get nasty? That’s fine, Reyes, I’ve been ripped down by worse than you and dealt with it. But you can push as hard as you want, I’m not going anywhere and neither is anyone upstairs, so all you’re going to do is hurt the people you love and, when you’ve stopped being angry, you’ll be sick with guilt.”

He advances on her, “I know you, after my mom died, I did a lot of the same things you’re doing now.”

She’s glaring murderously at him, “You don’t know me.”

“I know you’ve thrown every damn thing you could at Wick and he’s still here,” Bellamy replies, “And it sure as hell isn’t because he doesn’t have options, because I’ve seen him turn down other women.”

Raven glares and slams the hood shut, causing him to jump, “Well, I have options too.”

He grabs her arm as she goes to storm past, “Did any of those options drive you home from the hospital after the car accident?” he asks,

“Which of those options built you a brace? Or agreed to give up their spring break driving to a wedding for you and paying way too much for a room, a gift and a suit for people he doesn’t even know?”

“Oh, so now money should determine how nice I am to a guy?” she demands,

“Is that how your mom kept the lights on?”

Bellamy releases her, “I honestly don’t know,” he answers, “Your guess is as good as mine.”

He jerks his chin to the other car, “Let me know if the cars are good.”

  
He spins on his heel, marching back into the warmth of the building.

Twenty minutes later, Raven returns to the apartment just as Harper is portioning out their dinner and she makes her way over, sitting down next to him.

  
“Both cars are in pretty good condition,” she mumbles, swallowing as she reaches down and squeezes his hand underneath the table, an unspoken apology in her red eyes.

“Good to know.” He grins, squeezing back.

  
Relief floods her features and she turns to where Wick is still sitting on the kitchen counter,

  
“So, is it too late to talk music options for the ride?” she asks loudly, “Because I can only endure two hours of 500 miles max.”

To his credit, Wick manages a casual expression as he ambles over to them,

“Two and a half.” he jokes and she rolls her eyes,

“I think after ten minutes of Jasper singing along you’ll either be changing the music or jumping out of the moving vehicle.”

“I’m not going.” Jasper calls from the bathroom, repeating himself as he had been for the last two weeks.

* * *

 

 


	4. A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words, but a lot less than the Wedding

Friday 29th March

 

Having managed the drive through Trikru National Park more times than he could count, Lincoln was able to navigate the winding roads and hairpin turns leading to Mt Weather. Barely even concentrating as he followed the wooden signage and directions until he came to a rolling stop at the assigned parking for the hotel.

A young man in uniform chewing gum ambles over from the booth, squinting into the car as Lincoln rolled the windows down,  
  


“Can I help you?”

“Just looking to park.” Lincoln says, eyeing the long stretch of lot and choosing a spot,

“I’m sorry, this parking lot is for only guests of Mt Weather hotel and resort,” the man tells him, “The visitor parking lot is on the complete other side of the mountain.”

  
Yeah, it was going to be one of _those_ places.

  
“I’m staying at the hotel,” he responds, “Lincoln Woods.”

  
The young man straightens up and backs over to his booth, as if expecting any second that Lincoln would hit the gas and speed into his precious uncovered asphalt parking area.

He picks up a heavy book which Lincoln assumes they’ve handwritten the names of guests in. Holding it close to his face as he checks the ledger.

Managing not to roll his eyes until he was looking away, he picks up his phone, turning it on and checking the signal.

Two bars and he wasn’t picking up any net connection.

The young man is now radioing to confirm that he was a guest and Lincoln takes a moment to be glad that he’d followed Nyko’s advice and thrown a sports coat over his white t-shirt ten miles back.

But in about five minutes, he was going to follow Indra’s advice, which had been,

_‘Don’t be a fool, Mt Weather hasn’t been friendly to black people since the English conquered it, stay the hell away from that nonsense.’_

The young man comes back and Lincoln checks the name tag; wondering who the hell had hated this boy enough to call him Deets.

  
“Parking is straight through,” Deets informs him, “Enjoy your stay, Mr Woods.”

  
Lincoln thinks about giving this young man a disapproving glare, maybe a few hours worry about getting a complaint with the dreaded R word accusation that white people feared more than the act itself. 

But that would solve nothing and he was better than that.

“Thank-you.” he says, smiling and driving forward, sliding into a spot facing the forest and killing the engine. He climbs out the car, grateful to have reached his destination and stretches, lifting his arms above his head and causing Deets to noticeably pale as he took in his six ft two muscled build.

One of the last messages he’d received had been from Monty, informing him that for the wedding, the shuttle from the parking lot to the resort would be running every hour on Friday and Sunday.

This had been around one am and he’d turned his phone off after that to sleep.

He hadn’t turned on his data before driving and without any access to the internet now, he could only imagine the ridiculous amount of notifications he would face when he got to the resort.

Despite being in two cars together for ten or so hours, allowing for the stops at gas stations and to stretch their legs, he had no doubt that the primary form of communication for the friends sitting next to each other had been over their group chats.

But maybe Octavia had resorted to texting him?

Perching himself on the trunk of his car, Lincoln crossed his long legs at the ankle and held the phone high to see if he could get any reception.

Two bars dropped down to one.

Wasn’t this how horror movies started?

He could almost hear the tongue-lashing Indra would give at his funeral.

This is what happened when you ignored the matriarch.

Giving up on one last message to the woman he loved, Lincoln grabbed his camera from the front passenger seat and headed to the edge of the forest, moving along until he found the sunlight filtering through the leaves of one tree onto a ring of mushrooms.

Hanging the expensive device around his neck, he looks over his shoulder as he hears another car approached, he had another three or so hours before Octavia and her friends arrived, but he had still been hopeful until he saw the Lexus.

A suited man climbs out of the driver’s seat, ignoring Deets as he opens the door for a young woman who gave him a quick smile and stepped to the side, talking into her phone as her suitcases were unloaded.

  
“Yes…I’m here…well, not here, here. I’m at the parking area…I can’t head inside yet, there’s no shuttle…no, Anya, I’m not going to be murdered between the parking lot and the resort, honestly…”

  
She pauses and gives her name to Deets before resuming her phone call,  
  
  
“Yes, Anya, I’m aware I’m a white girl on a mountain, but, if horror movies tell us anything, when things go south I have the best chance of surviving til the end credits.”

  
Lincoln’s lips twitch in humour and, despite the fact that the girl was wearing high-end designer from her sunglasses down to her heeled boots, he figures he could make conversation with her until the shuttle arrived.

  
“Anya…I’m gonna hang up now…hello?”

  
The woman swore and pulled her phone back to glare at the screen,

  
“No reception,” Lincoln called by way of introduction, “I’m surprised your call lasted this long.”

  
She glances up and her eyes run over him before narrowing in a thousand-yard stare and he’s writing her off before she speaks,

  
“Are you…” she pauses and he’s already praying that the next word out of her mouth isn’t ‘black’ or ‘valet’ when she continues, “Octavia’s Lincoln?”

He breaks into a friendly grin, extending his hand, “For almost a year now.”

She takes it and beams, “Clarke Griffin,” she introduces herself, “Bellamy’s girlfriend.”

  
Oh.

Octavia was going to be _furious_ that he’d met her first.

  
“Nice to meet you,” he says, “What gave me away?”

“The camera,” she answers, gesturing to his chest, “Bellamy told me you were a photographer and a giant, but at my height, that’s…everybody.”

  
He glances at her boots and realises that she must be Octavia’s height.

Which is tiny, not that he would ever say that, though as a chiropractor, Nyko had been thrilled when he’d started dating her.

Lincoln was now a regular client.

  
“You need help with your suitcase?” he offers but she waves him away,

“Oh, it’s fine, there’s honestly not much in here.”

  
Heading to his car to grab his things, the two of them head to the park bench at the designated waiting area for the shuttle.

Lincoln takes time to study her profile, she was conventionally pretty, blonde hair, blue eyes, pale skin, but with a fuller figure than the models he typically worked with. Still, the way she moved, every step she took showed that she’d had lessons in deportment, and the way she positioned herself suggested she had done some modelling work. 

He couldn’t shake the feeling that he’d seen her somewhere before.

  
“Are you from Arkadia?” he asks and she shakes her head,  
  
“Not really, I haven’t lived there in years, my mom lives there though, with my future step-father.”

He’s searching for another question when she smiles, tilting her head, “He’s Marcus Kane.”

He takes a moment to place the name, “Bellamy’s boss.”

She hums in confirmation, “That’s actually how he and I met, mom kept texting me about the new love of Kane’s life, I honestly Bellamy was Kane’s secret side-piece or a caboodle until I ambushed him at work.”

Lincoln laughed, “If it helps, Octavia refers to Kane as the love of Bellamy’s life, and his BFF.”

Clarke puts a hand on her heart and mimics an artistic expression of grief, “It must be true.”

  
Other people are starting to arrive now and when an older couple approach the park bench, Lincoln automatically gets up, standing beside Clarke only to have the woman sniff pointedly at them both, clutching her designer handbag to her stomach as she sat down on the far edge of the bench.

Okay then.

Clarke gives the woman an unimpressed look before flipping down her sunglasses and turning her back on her, looking up at Lincoln,

  
“So, should I try asking about photography to lure you into a false sense of security, or can I ask about Octavia right away?”

He grins, “I’ll gladly talk about her, but I’m in love with her, so I can’t be impartial.”

She gives a half-shrug, “All I need to know is how to win her over.”

  
Lincoln isn’t usually much of a talker, he can hold up his end of a conversation but prefers to sit back and listen.

If he has to defend himself, he’ll argue that he talks more than Nate Miller, who he met about ten months ago and has probably only spoken about two hundred words since then.

But, here with Clarke, he finds himself talking easily, about how he met Octavia, their first date, how soon he knew he was in love with her and their plans for the future, how amazing a dancer he thought she was, how he loved attending the shows she performed in at least once a week, how she had tentatively discussed her retirement plan of opening a gym that catered to former dancers and the typical injuries that they ended up with. When he finds himself about to run out of things to say, she asks him about his career and he barely even notices when they get on the shuttle and it climbs up the mountain.

The hotel is at the very peak of the mountain, a massive stone structure set into three wings with windows that reflected the morning sun. They took their turn shuffling off the bus and Lincoln carried both their suitcases into the reception area where a fire was crackling merrily in the hearth, despite it being spring.

A large wall of windows looked out over the slopes that would be perfect for skiing in the winter and the only thing breaking up the bluestone and rich wooden panelling was the caramel leather couches and the red velvet armchairs.

They were last to check-in, but between the four reception staff, it barely took ten minutes before Lincoln had his room key and his bag had been whisked off by a bellboy.

Clarke is waiting for him a few feet away,  
  
  
“I’m starving,” she complains, “I was thinking of grabbing breakfast before going on one of the hiking trails?”

He checks the time on the wall, “I can meet you at the restaurant in half an hour?” he suggests, “I just need to unpack my stuff.”

“Sounds perfect,” she agrees and he is once again struck by a sense of familiarity.

“I swear I’ve seen you somewhere before,” he notes, frowning slightly as he tries to place her but she only shrugs, “I’ve got one of those faces.”

  
The least expensive rooms at the resort were the ones that faced towards the building, rather than the mountain or the valley, which is why the group was all on the same floor.

Although, Lincoln does note that he can’t see Clarke anywhere when he gets off the elevator.

He has to admit that the room is nearly worth the fifteen hundred dollars he and Octavia are spending for the three-night stay. The two leather armchairs by the fireplace, the large balcony and the marble bathroom with the bathtub situated by the large window, means that at the very least the two of them would have a romantic weekend, once the wedding was over.

He finally manages to set up the Wi-Fi and his phone nearly jumps out of his hand it’s vibrating so hard. The number of alerts he has on the group chat keeps steadily rising and he manages to unpack the essentials and hang up his suit before the device finally goes quiet.

* * *

 

_Group Chat: Delinquents do a Wedding._

_Lincoln Woods: Okay, unless any of the previous messages were emergencies, I’m just going to ignore them all._

_Lincoln Woods: I’m at the hotel._

_Lincoln Woods: I’m checked in._

_Jasper Jordan: I can’t believe you’re going to ignore our messages,_

_Jasper Jordan: As if every last one of them wasn’t lovingly crafted._

_Jasper Jordan: As if anything you could say could be as poetic as Monty’s four am ramblings._

_Lincoln Woods: I’ve met Bellamy’s girlfriend._

_Zoe Monroe: Really? Is sheadsjgalkjagraergaetb_

* * *

 

Lincoln paused, starting to feel concern.

* * *

 

_Group Chat: Delinquents do a Wedding._

_Lincoln Woods: Is everyone okay?_

_Kyle Wick: What is happening?_

_Lincoln Woods: Octavia are you okay?_

_Kyle Wick: Okay, from what we can see, the car went off the road._

_Lincoln Woods: Tell me where, I’ll come get you._

* * *

 

No-one responds and he swears, calling Octavia and feeling sick with every second that the phone went unanswered.

  
“ _I’m fine!_ ” she cried, the second the call connected and he sank down onto the bed with relief,

“What happened?” he asked, “Is anyone hurt?”

She sighed, “When Jasper saw your message, he screamed and thrashed about and caused Harper to veer off the road.”

“Everyone is fine,” she continues, and he can hear her walking, “For now, but Bellamy just pulled a hell of a U-turn and I’m pretty sure he’s coming back to run Jasper over.”

“Was the car damaged?” he queries, wondering how the hell he could possibly get out and pick them up if it was. Chances are they were in the middle of nowhere, not exactly easy to pinpoint on a gps.

“No, I mean we veered onto gravel and Harper’s a little shaken up but nothing happened to the car.”

“Good,” he exhales, “As long as you’re okay.”

She chuckles, “I love you too.”

  
On her end of the line, he hears a distant bellowing and figures that Bellamy must be tearing Jasper a new one for having startled Harper so badly.

  
“So,” he drawls, “Clarke Griffin.”

“I cannot believe that you met her first!” Octavia hisses, “Tell me everything!”

He checks his phone and starts heading down, “She’s lovely,” he begins, “Really nice personality, she’s beautiful, not as beautiful as you, obviously,” he adds and Octavia hums in approval, “Turns out her mom is dating Marcus Kane, which is how she and Bellamy met.”

“Of _fucking_ course, my brother is in love with someone related to his boss!” Octavia exclaims.

“You’re an idiot, Bell!” she shouts down the road.

“What else?” she demands, “What does she do for a living?”

Lincoln opens his mouth but realises that he didn’t actually know, he hadn’t asked her any questions about herself.

“I’ll find out,” he promises, “She and I are having breakfast now.”

His girlfriend groans, “Lucky, we won’t get there before lunch.”

“See if you can get a picture of her.” She suggests and Lincoln smiles,

“If I can do it without seeming creepy, I will.”

* * *

 

There is discreet signage in the reception area to the restaurant, and Lincoln follows it through to a large room with floor to ceiling windows with booths set up for viewing the mountain.

There’s a bar in the centre which is currently serving coffee and he spots Clarke’s blonde hair, heading over to see that she’s surrounded by people.

Four of them, on all sides and he imagines a school of sharks circling.

Trying to figure out how to rescue her, he approaches and the smile she was already wearing widens,

  
“Hey, Lincoln,” she called, “I got us the table in the corner.”

  
She gestures and he sees a waiter setting up a large booth for them at the other end of the room. He nods and lingers so she’ll have the option of leaving with him.

  
“Lincoln,” the man on the other side of her says, “Lincoln Woods?”

He preferred ‘Octavia’s Lincoln’, but he could answer to that as well.

  
“Hi,” he greets, unwilling to reach over Clarke to shake his hand, “Nice to meet you.”

  
This guy is all floppy hair and disapproving eyes,

  
“How do _you two_ know each other?” he asks Clarke, as if checking her relationship status and Lincoln feels offended on Bellamy’s behalf.

“She’s dating Bellamy,” he explains and she laughs,

“Oh my God, I forgot to mention, Gina,” she addresses the woman in front of her, “I’m actually here for your wedding.”

Gina Martin’s eyes widen slightly, “You’re _dating_ Bellamy Blake?” she clarifies and Clarke nods,

“Since December.”

  
The woman slightly behind Gina has turned an alarming shade of green he didn’t actually know was possible outside of literature or severe cases of food poisoning and he wants to ask if she’s okay.

He looks about for a waiter to bring the girl water or an antacid when he’s distracted by the papers spread across the bar.

Newspapers from around the country and the world, interrupted with the famous fashion magazines.

And on one of the covers, is a very familiar face, with the headline,

‘Most Beautiful Woman of 2016 talks about her upcoming film ‘Commander of Death’’

He knows why he recognized her now.

Bellamy Blake was dating Clarissa Glacier, world famous movie star.

And had brought her to his ex-girlfriend’s wedding.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Surprise!  
> Will explain the stage name next chapter


	5. In Which Evil Spirits are not Awakened

Friday 29th March

 

Road trips seemed like fun in theory.

In practise, after the first few hours, the novelty wore off.

Especially when nine people were spread out over two cars, going on twelve hours, and headed towards a wedding they didn’t really want to go to.

After about hour nine, when the phone reception had cut out, along with access to the internet, Bellamy had begun contemplating driving the car off one of the hairpin turns into a tree.

It was probably a good thing his little sister had been riding shotgun.

At least until she couldn’t sleep anymore, had listened to enough music and was out of ways to distract herself.  
  


“ _Bell!_ ” she groaned, poking him with one socked foot, “I’m _bored!_ ”  
  


Bellamy rolled his eyes and checked the car in front of them, after bellowing himself hoarse at Jasper, he’d agreed to let the car occupancy remain the same, provided Zoe drove the rest of the way.

  
“Nothing much I can do about that, O,” he pointed out, “Should be there in about an hour.”

She groans and kicks him again, thankfully waiting until he’s taken his hand off the steering wheel, “So bored!”

“We’re all bored,” Raven bitches from the backseat, “No net, no reception, can’t even contact the other car. What’re we supposed to do?”

  
Bellamy found his nerves fraying a bit, and there was no point stopping at this stage, not when they were so close,

  
“Well, for starters,” he snapped, “You could talk to your boyfriend, maybe ask him to keep his hands to himself while I’m driving?”

Wick, caught unawares, held his hands up and tucked them into his lap while Raven kicked Bellamy’s seat with her good leg,

  
“He was massaging my hip, you creep,” she tells him, “I’m a little sore.”

“I may have majored in history, Reyes, but I know enough about anatomy to know his hand was nowhere near your goddamn hip.”

“ _Ew!_ ” Octavia cried, “Gross, I’m in the car, Raven!”

“Oh, like you and Lincoln never got handsy in a car!” she countered.

“Ah, no,” his sister protested, “Because we’re fitness freaks, we get handsy on hikes like cool people.”

“Pretty sure that’s how most horror movies begin.” Wick interjects.

“I will drive this car off a cliff,” Bellamy warns, “Do _not_ test me on this!”

  
Octavia turns to him, twisting in her seat, her back to the door and tilts her head, narrowing her eyes slightly,

  
“I know what we can talk about,” she announces, “Your girlfriend!”

  
Honestly, he was kind of surprised it had taken them this long to start badgering him about her.

  
“Yes!” Raven laughed, shifting until she could put her arms on their headrests and lean between them, “Tell us everything!”

He rolled his eyes, even as he found himself smiling,

  
“Not much to tell,” he tries but the other three members of the car boo loudly, “Fine, fine, her name is Clarke Griffin, she’s Kane’s step-daughter and I met her in his office when she surprised him during one of our meetings.”

“Does she know Kane is the love of your life?” Octavia teases and Raven laughs right in his ear,

“She may have suggested as much.” he allows and Wick snickers,

“What does she do for a living?” his sister asks, “Lincoln didn’t tell me.”

“She works in film and music production.” he says, which technically isn’t a lie.

  
Honestly, when they’d first met, he’d had no idea that she was famous, with Spotify and Netflix, he only listened to the same music he had for years and none of her films had been recommended to him. They’d met at Kane’s office and then ran into each other at his house, where he had been to binge-watch and critique a new documentary series and Clarke had just been hanging around on the couch.

At three pm. In pyjamas.

They’d exchanged numbers and chatted for ages before she had told him point blank why she was always out of the country.

He’d responded that the time difference explained why he always got her messages at weird hours and from there, they’d been long distance friends.

Until Miller had invited her to the wedding and on Christmas day, they’d got really, really flirty with one another.

She’d come to Arkadia to visit her family on New Year’s Eve and with his friends having not been sober since Christmas Eve, they didn’t even notice he’d snuck out to see her.

They’d spent hours in a little hole in the wall café, chatting over endless cups of coffee until the place closed and then they’d gone to a nearby park and ended up bickering over whether or not the pond there would have ducks in the spring.

They’d had plans for New Year’s but she’d been exhausted from her filming schedule and ended up crashing in his bed instead.

He hadn’t cared. They’d spent New Year’s Day in that bed.

They hadn’t seen each other in person since, but they’d clocked in an average of six hours a week minimum chatting on the phone or skype (and usually kept their clothes on for half that time) and sent each other thousands of little messages throughout the day.

And this weekend kicked off her month-long vacation which Bellamy was hoping to convince her to spend living out of his apartment.

Octavia holds her hand out expectantly and Bellamy glances down at her calloused palm,

  
“You haven’t given me a high-five since you turned nineteen.” He points out,

“No, you idiot,” she scoffs, “Hand over your phone, I want to see photos.”

“It’s in the door,” Raven tells her, pointing and Octavia leans over his lap in a way that has him swearing,

“Don’t worry,” his friend continues, “I’m sure she’s done this before.”

“I _will_ drive this car off a cliff,” Bellamy repeats, “Do not test me!”

Octavia pushes herself back into a seating position, “Okay,” she mumbles, unlocking his phone, “Before I go any further, are there dick pics on this thing?”

“ _Fuck, no!_ ” he shouts as Raven barks with laughter, “What kind of guy do you think I am, O?!”

She shrugs, “Just checking.”

  
He gives her side eye that is cut short because they’ve got a hairpin turn coming up, and he should really concentrate on the road. Octavia scrolls through his phone and frowns,

  
“Jeez Bell, you only have like a hundred pics on this thing?”

“How many are of Kane?” Raven asks, shifting over to get a better look and Wick grumbles in protest when she puts her knee on his thigh,

“Probably ninety-five.”

“We don’t have many photos together,” he tells his sister, “But she’s blonde if that helps.”

Octavia holds the phone with the screen pointed to him, “Is this her?”

He sees Harper’s smiling face as she poses cross-legged under the Christmas tree.

“Nope.” Bellamy answers, a smile pulling at the corners of his mouth,

“Is this her?”

  
Monroe, bent intently over the Monopoly board, her coloured money in neat piles around her.

  
“No.” he answered and she searched through his photos.

“Is this her?”

Bellamy glanced at the image and frowned, “Why is Wick’s naked body on my phone?”

“What?!” Wick put his hands on Raven’s hips and she yelped as he lifted her into the seat beside him, enabling him to shift into her former position,

“Why is my naked body on your phone?!”

“I mean…” Octavia stalled, “You’re covered with a towel…”

“Hang on,” Raven called from the back seat, “Bellamy and I were both downstairs while Wick was showering, so…who took that photo?”

Wick falls back into his seat with a sigh, “You guys are so far removed from the definition of normal friends, I swear to god…”

“Wait!” Octavia cried, “I found her!”

  
Probably distracting Wick mere seconds before he decided to throw himself from the car.

Bellamy glances over and checks that his sister is actually seeing a photo of Clarke this time.

It was one he had taken of her in the park, by the potential duck pond, she was wrapped up in his scarf and a beanie, her focus on the icy water so only part of her face was visible.

The three other occupants of the car hummed and leaned closer, studying every aspect of the photo, zooming in and out repeatedly.

  
“This tells us little,” Octavia rules, while Bellamy feels a thrill of satisfaction that they’ve reached the point where they are getting signs directing them to Mt Weather.

“Is this the only photo you have?” she demands and he shrugs,

“Sorry I don’t live my life like an Instagram model.”

The three of them boo him again and Octavia climbs into the backseat, jostling Wick as she settles beside Raven,

  
“What does this tell us?” she asks and the two of them suddenly become amateur detectives deducing Clarke is blonde haired, fair skinned, wearing Bellamy’s scarf but her own beanie and had short nails. They study her clothes and praise her for choosing practicality over fashion that day and Bellamy himself takes a vow of silence until they hand him back his phone,

“Just…” he pauses and chooses his next words carefully, “Be nice to her, okay? She’s really excited to meet you guys.”

“Have you not warned her about them?” Wick queries, “Because if I had known what level of crazy I was dating in to…”

Raven leans across Octavia to smack his shoulder and he shrugs, “What? Some warning would have been nice.”

“She knows,” Bellamy swears, “She and I were friends before we started dating, so she copped a lot of bitching from me, especially with this wedding but she still wants to meet you all. She’s really nice and kind, so be nice to her.”

“When are we ever not nice?” Octavia demands and he gives her a pointed look,

“Octavia, I’ve seen you reduce hardened police officers to tears.”

“Raven broke a NASA engineer,” Wick volunteered and she smacked him again,

“What?! You did.”

“We’ll be on our best behaviour.” Raven assures him and he wishes that meant something.

* * *

 

The Mt Weather hotel parking lot is nearly full when they arrive shortly after midday and they have to take parks at opposite ends.

The staff member requires not only their names but photo ID of everyone in the car and their connection to the wedding party.

Bellamy usually only endures this level of interrogation from cops looking to meet monthly quotas.

He lets them in with obvious reluctance, even after Zoe flashes her military ID and asks whether there’s concern about a terror incident, trying to make it clear to the young man that he is overreacting.

Lincoln is waiting for them, hands in his pockets and after Octavia pointedly walks past him, pretending not to recognise him, he turns to Bellamy and holds out his hand,

  
“Aspirin,” he explains, “Take it now.”

Concerned, Bellamy dry-swallows the two white tablets, “Why?”

“Gina’s bridesmaid, Roma?” Lincoln prompts, “Pretty sure she and Finn are planning to tag-team your savage beating.”

Bellamy frowns, “What the hell did I do?”

He raises his eyebrows and rocks back on his heels, “Clarke?” he prompts, “You brought a _movie star_ to your ex-girlfriend’s wedding?”

“I…” he splutters, “We’re dating!”

“Yeah,” Lincoln allows, “When she’s not being paid thousands of dollars for photo shoots.”

He jerks his chin to a path leading up a hill,

  
“She’s actually behind me,” he tells him quietly, “We decided to hike down to meet you, but she somehow got reception and took a call.”

  
Bellamy thanks him and starts moving towards the path as Lincoln is distracted by Octavia finally pretending to remember him as a long-lost boyfriend. He hears the cat calls and assumes the greeting is getting very romantic so he picks up the pace.

Clarke is perched on a low hanging tree branch, overlooking a steep hill with a lake below, her feet swinging slightly as she talks on the phone,

  
“Yes, Anya, I’m still alive…I know you’re surprised but I even walked through a forest and survived. What? No, I didn’t come across any Satanic artefacts and release an ancient curse upon the world. No, I didn’t find any inbred cannibals luring campers to their death…okay, are you concerned about the location or my own survival skills?”  
  
Bellamy approaches, placing his hands on the branch either side of her thighs and leaning in to steal a quick kiss while she rolls her eyes at the phone call,  
  
“Anya, I have to go…Bellamy is here…yes, he has finally arrived…no, I don’t think he’s part of a secret plot to lock me in a cage and torture me to death…okay, when I get back to Polis, we need to talk about your viewing habits…bye.”

She hangs up and smiles at him, “Hi.” she breathes, cupping his face and drawing him in for a long kiss. As always, kissing her feels both exciting and like he’s coming home. He moans into her mouth and steps between her legs, kissing her deeper as he moves his hands to her hips to keep her upright.

  
“Anya doesn’t like me.” he notes drily when they break for air, but Clarke only shrugs,

“Anya doesn’t like anyone,” she assures him, “Her main issue is that one of her stars has gone off on vacation with their secret boyfriend and she can’t monitor the situation or call the hotel and ask them to ban their staff from leaking to the press.”

Bellamy snorts, “At least the press won’t be getting to the resort,” he mutters, “The guy at the parking lot doesn’t want to let anybody in.”

Clarke snickers and pulls him close for another kiss, “I’ve missed you.” she whispers against his lips, “I’ve missed you too.”

“ _I’ve missed you, three!_ ” a voice calls and they turn in unison to where Jasper was standing with his hand over his eyes,

“Octavia sent me to collect you two and to make sure Bellamy ‘wasn’t doing the sex with his girlfriend because that’s how horror movies start’.”

  
Bellamy groaned, resting his head on Clarke’s shoulder as she laughs,

  
“This one is Jasper, right?”

Jasper nods, “Yep, nice to meet you,” he offers, holding out his free hand, with his eyes still covered and she pushes Bellamy back a step so she can go over and take his hand, shaking it gently, “Nice to meet you, don’t worry, we’re dressed.”

He pulls his hand away and blinks in the light, “Welcome to the cult,” he quips, “We’re just going to need your social security number, blood type and will to escape.”

Bellamy groans, running a hand through his hair, “Just once, could you be normal?”

Jasper bounces on his heels, “Where’s the fun in that?”

  
He turns to Clarke, and his expression falters a little bit,

  
“Have we met?” he asks, “You look familiar?”

Bellamy had wondered how long it would take for her to be recognised, but Clarke only shrugs,

  
“I think I would remember meeting you,” she answers, vaguely, turning to look down the hill, “Is that the shuttle?”

“Oh yeah,” Jasper perks up, “That’s why Octavia sent me to get you.”

  
Bellamy sighs, coming forward to take Clarke’s hand, their fingers linking together,

  
“You didn’t think to mention that?”

  
He shrugs and falls in behind them as they walk down, and Bellamy doesn’t want to think about why it isn’t until Jasper is looking at Clarke’s back that he finally figures out who she is, gaping and gesturing wildly which thankfully she doesn’t notice, but Bellamy issues him a warning glare as they return to the parking lot.

Lincoln must have taken the time to warn their friends about Clarke and let them get the shock out of their systems, because when they reach them, they all remain calm and even manage to tone it down on the starstruck but trying to be overly-casual attitude.

  
“So,” Octavia drawls, “You’re Kane’s step-daughter.”

“I am,” Clarke confirms, “And I used this as the main selling point when trying to convince your brother to date me.”

Bellamy gives her an unimpressed look, “Really? You’re gonna climb on that bandwagon?”

She shrugs as the shuttle driver clears his throat pointedly, “Honestly, I’m just waiting for you to slip and call me Marcus in the bedroom.”

Miller chokes on his laughter while Raven doesn’t even bother, “You know,” she says as they start climbing onto the shuttle, “One of these days, we should really meet Professor Kane.”

“He and my mom are getting married in August,” she tells them, sitting beside Bellamy but twisting in her seat,

“It’s going to be a casual backyard wedding, but if Bellamy here,” she pats his knee, “Promises not to speak up when the priest asks for objections, I’m sure they would be glad to have his friends come along.”

“You’re assuming we survive this wedding,” Harper points out and Clarke laughs,

“Yeah, I’ve heard about the invitations and some of the other expenses,” she grimaces,

“It’ll at least be interesting.”


	6. Chapter 6

Friday 29th March

 

_Group Chat: Delinquents do a Wedding_

_Jasper Jordan: Bellamy, where are you?_

_Jasper Jordan: Are you too cool for us now?_

_Octavia Blake: As if that’s ever something we’ll have to be concerned about._

_Bellamy Blake: I’m in my hotel room,_

_Bellamy Blake: Unpacking, like everyone else?_

_Harper McIntyre: Not on this floor you’re not._

_Bellamy Blake: I’m one floor up from you guys._

_Bellamy Blake: Because I booked my room first._

_Bellamy Blake: Because I’m organized._

_Kyle Wick: Can we organize adding Clarke to the group chat?_

_Kyle Wick: I feel as though it’s only fair, if Miller, Lincoln and I have to deal with the crazy, she should too._

_Bellamy Blake: I’m not sure she has Facebook._

_Lincoln Woods: Everyone has Facebook, Bellamy, your grandparents in the Philippines have Facebook._

_Octavia Blake: You should all follow his grandfather on Instagram, he takes really nice pictures._

_Bellamy Blake: Okay, how do I add people to chats?_

_Raven Reyes: Man, this is just sad._

_Octavia Blake: Ffs, give the phone to Clarke._

 

* * *

 

_Clarke Griffin has sent Octavia Blake a friend request._

_Octavia Blake is now friends with Clarke Griffin._

* * *

 

_Group Chat: Delinquents do a Wedding_

_Octavia Blake has added Clarke Griffin to the group._

_Clarke Griffin: Thanks, Octavia, figured it’d be easier to just go around Bellamy._

_Octavia Blake:  Story of my life._

_Bellamy Blake: Don’t come crying to me next time you’re sick and need someone to make you soup._

_Octavia Blake: I’m gonna message Iolo and tell him you’re going to let me starve._

_Bellamy Blake: Yeah right._

* * *

 

“Are you _kidding_ me?!”

Clarke looked over his shoulder and burst out laughing when she saw the international number on his phone screen,

  
“What time even is it in the Philippines, right now?” she asks and he takes a moment to do the math in his head.

“Two am, give or take.” He answers, rolling his eyes as he takes the call.

  
Bellamy’s father was a native Filipino businessman who had only been in the U.S long enough to meet, marry and widow Aurora Blake, having died in a hit and run when Bellamy had been five months old.  

He had been about two years old when his paternal grandparents had found out about him and sent Aurora a letter, asking to be a part of his life. When Octavia had been born and her father had vanished into the night, his Iola had started referring to her as her second grandchild.

Which was why Bellamy was getting a call from his grandfather after midnight.

  
“Hi Iolo,” he greets, “No, I am not letting Octavia starve, bakit ka pa rin sa facebook sa oras na ito?” (why are you on Facebook at this hour anyway?)

  
Clarke is still chuckling as she leads him to the door, taking the elevator one floor down and meet up with everyone to grab lunch in the restaurant.   
Octavia is looking satisfied until Bellamy speaks entirely in Tagalog, at which point she pushes him into the elevator and begins whacking his arms.

  
“What’s he saying?” Monty asks as he ducks behind Lincoln, who merely glances over his shoulder and goes back to showing Miller the photos he’s already taken.

“I don’t know,” she admits, “But fun fact, if you ever hear two Filipinos having a conversation without any English in it, chances are they’re bitching about you.”

  
He flips her a vulgar gesture and thankfully the doors open, letting other people in before she can retaliate.

The elevator is massive, but he still holds out an arm, ushering his friends to the side so there’s plenty of room for the family getting on.

And the parents with their two point five kids are all dressed as if on their way to church and give them- in their casual clothes- disparaging looks.

Except the daughter who is about ten years old, phone in hand and glances at Clarke a few times before recognizing her and her eyes go almost comically wide.

Clarke smiles and gives her a quick wave as they reach the lobby and pour out.

Having been to the restaurant already, Clarke and Lincoln lead the way and find that it’s already beginning to fill up with hotel guests all essentially stuck on the mountain.

Bellamy is still in the middle of trying to convince his Iolo that Octavia is being fed and cared for and that yes, he is eating plenty of fish and vegetables and being a responsible adult. So, he kisses his girlfriend on the cheek and gestures that he’s going to head outside.

There’s three large swimming pools at the resort, one a whirlpool, one a steam pool and one regular grouped together around a bar and lounge chairs, which he props himself on while finishing the call.

His grandfather transfers the phone to his grandmother who, despite it being three am her time, proceeds to gossip about her neighbours and he lies back on the chair, closing his eyes and hoping Clarke will remember him fondly.

He finds himself trying to figure out when he last drank water, and whether dehydration would be what killed him when a shadow blocks the sun he had closed his eyes against. Opening them and squinting as he readjusted to the light, he sat up and told his grandmother that he had to go.

  
“Gina?” he asked, tilting his head as he tried to get a better look, “Is that you?”

  
She shifted to the lounge chair beside him and he wiped at the water in his eyes,

  
“What’s left of me.” she jokes and he grins, “Hi, uh…congratulations, I guess?”

She gives him a wry smile, “Premature, but thanks.”

He nods, blushing slightly at his own awkwardness, “So, uh, what are you doing down here?”

She holds up her hand, showing a pack of cigarettes, “Smoking.”

  
He pursed his lips, remembering the time she had made Jasper and Monty smoke their weed outside in January because she hated second-hand smoke.   
  
  
“When did you start?”

“When my future mother-in-law told me that if I didn’t get under a hundred and twenty-five pounds that she and the Collins family wouldn’t pay for the stuff they’d already booked.”

  
Bellamy’s eyebrows shot up and he ran his eyes over her figure, suddenly noticing that she didn’t have the same shape she’d had when they’d dated. In fact, her curves were almost entirely gone.

He isn’t entirely sure what he’s supposed to say to that,   
  


“You look beautiful, no matter what.” he manages and she grins, “Thank-you.”

  
She still lights up the cigarette and turns her face to blow the smoke away from him,

  
“So,” she drawls, “Clarissa Glacier?”

He ducks his head, smiling slightly at her name, “Her mom named her Clarissa with the middle name, Katherine-Elizabeth,” he begins, “She prefers her nickname Clarke.”

“You brought a _superstar_ to my wedding and _that’s_ what you’re opening with?” she teases, aiming a lazy kick at his shins, “How’d you two meet? Tell me everything.”

He gives her a brief account as she finishes her cigarette and immediately reaches for another one,

“I really like her,” he says, “she’s amazing.”

He could have talked about her for hours but his phone chimes.

* * *

 

_Text Message_

_World’s Okay-est Sister: Dude, where TF are you?!”_

_World’s Okay-est Sister: Don’t even want to tell you how badly the waitress is flirting with your gf right now._

_World’s Okay-est Brother: Coming, O._

 

* * *

 

“I’m missing lunch with my friends,” he explains, “I should go.”

She nods, “Try and have fun this weekend.”

“Are you…” he stops, unsure whether to ask, but can’t bring himself to ignore the issue, “Okay?” he finishes and she sighs,

“I will be so glad once this wedding is over,” she admits, “The only thing I’ve had any control over is that I technically am getting a wedding in a forest.”

He grimaces, “I’m here…if you need to talk.”

She reaches over and squeezes his hand, “Thank-you, Bellamy, truly.”

* * *

 

Meals were included in the hotel package, although alcohol wasn’t, but when he gets to the long table the waiters had set up in the middle of the room for their group, he saw several bottles gathered already.

“I’m bribing them to like me,” Clarke explains as he sits down, throwing an arm over the back of her chair, “Or just get them drunk until they have no standards.”

Harper snorts into her glass, “She thinks we have standards!” she chuckles,

“Yeah, they really don’t,” Miller commented, “They’ll let anyone into their sex cult.”

“I thought we agreed we weren’t going to call it that in public?” Lincoln countered,

“No, we agreed we weren’t gonna call it that anywhere around your people,” Octavia corrected, “But look around Lincoln, not a Trikru clan member in sight.”

Bellamy dropped his forehead onto Clarke’s shoulder, groaning, “Please get me away from the crazy.”

“Are you kidding?” she laughed, “I can’t wait to tell Anya I was invited to join another sex cult!”

“ _Another_ sex cult?” Monty echoes, “How many have you been asked to join?”

Clarke leans back in her chair, “Enough that I have perfected the rejection letter.”

  
Thankfully, their meals arrive before his friends can grill her for any more details and Bellamy sees that Octavia had ordered for him.

His suspicion confirmed when she helps herself to his food, picking at the sweet potato fries and dipping her vegetables in his gravy.

  
“Is it good?” he asks her sarcastically and she nods,

“Yep, delicious, you have good taste.”

  
He tries to nab one of the fries, only to have Octavia smack his hand away,

  
“Mine.”

“It’s on my plate!” he protests.

She rolls her eyes and pushes her side salad towards him, “Here, eat that.”

“The hell I will.”

  
They dissolve into petty bickering and meaningless threats of maiming or social media hacking until Bellamy remembers that he has a girlfriend and turns in his seat to see Clarke having accepted her abandonment and asking Raven and Wick about their jobs.

Whatever their plans had been for the afternoon, by the time the plates have been cleared and the alcohol consumed, the late night combined with the long drive had them all drowsy and yawning into their hands.

  
“It’s not warm enough to pass out by the pool.” Raven notes, half to herself while they all slowly and reluctantly climb to their feet.

“Everyone get some rest,” Bellamy orders, “Actual rest, not just checking out while playing video games.” he adds, pointing to Monty and Jasper who have the nerve to try and look innocent.

“We can meet up later.”

  
As with any group larger than four, getting them from one place to another after more than one drink is a lot like herding cats. Bellamy tried leading them from the restaurant to the lobby only to turn around at the door and see that Clarke had got held up by a young girl who was trying to ask her for her autograph. When she re-joined him, he found that Lincoln and Octavia had wandered over to the large windows overlooking the forest and were discussing when to get a hike in. Knowing Lincoln would follow his sister, he wrapped an arm around Octavia’s waist and half carried, half dragged her to the elevator.

Unfortunately, Raven and Monty took advantage of his momentary distraction to head to the reception desk and start asking about the internet speed or coverage or whatever it was that had them speaking in a technical language that neither Bellamy or the desk clerk could easily understand.

Knowing Raven would probably punch him if he tried to drag her away, he chose instead to handle the situation with maturity and level-headedness.

He pushed Wick into the elevator, pressed the button before he could stop him and told Raven that her boyfriend had gone up to their room without her.

Muttering under her breath, Raven stomped over to the elevator, Monty and Jasper following along in her wake.

Meanwhile, Monroe and Harper were canoodling by the crackling fire, looking like they were planning to join Gina and Finn at the altar tomorrow, and apparently unaware that they were being watched by a middle-aged man with a wedding ring and a very, very creepy expression on his face.

Bellamy scared the living daylights out of him by pointedly clearing his throat and the man scowled at him but by that point, he was herding the majority of his delinquents into the elevator. Holding the door for Miller who had spent the last half hour on the couch, playing on his phone but keeping an eye on the situation, meandering over as soon as Bellamy started looking for him.

As the doors begin to close, he hears creepy guy calling for him to hold the elevator and repeatedly jabs the button for the third floor with increasing force until the doors shut and they begin moving upwards.

Knowing there wasn’t anything on the first two floors to distract his people or give them any reason to get off, he breathed a sigh of relief and leaned back against the wall, Clarke watching him with a fond smirk playing across her lips.

When they reach the third floor, they’re greeted by the sight of Wick with crossed arms glaring at him,

  
“Dude,” he snaps, “Not cool.”

  
Bellamy doesn’t care, he pushes everyone except his girlfriend out of the elevator,

  
“Remember,” he calls as they begin shuffling to their rooms, “Get actual rest!”  
  


Clarke wraps her arms around his waist as the doors close and rests her face between his shoulder blades,

  
“You forgot to tell me you’re a parent,” she murmurs, “That’s kind of a deal breaker.”

He snorts, “Yeah, it’s a special woman who can love a man with eight kids…or six really,” he muses, “Lincoln acts his age and I can take my eyes off Miller without worrying that he’ll electrocute himself or be approached by a strange man asking about threesomes.”  
  


She smothers her laugh in his jacket and the physical proximity was already doing enough that he’s grateful there’s only about fifteen steps from the elevator to their room.

He slots the key card into the door and pulls Clarke in, stealing quick kisses as he walks her backwards to the couch and they drop onto the leather seats, wrapping their arms around each other and kissing deeper.

  
“Do you think they like me?” she asks when they break for air and he chuckled, kissing her jaw,

“Trust me,” he murmurs, “If they hadn’t, you and everyone else on this mountain would know.”

“But like me for _me_?” she continues, “Not Clarissa Glacier, but Clarke, Bellamy’s girlfriend.”

She’d been nervous about meeting his friends for weeks and he hadn’t realised just how much it meant to her.

And how much having it meant to her, meant to him.  
  


“They like you,” he assures her, nudging his nose against hers, “And the more they get to know the real you, the more they’ll like you, just like I do.”

“Probably not as much as you, right?” she teases, and he ducks his head to smile.

“No, I definitely plan to like you much, much more.”


	7. No Strippers were sourced in this chapter

Friday 29th March

 

_Group Chat: Delinquents do a Wedding_

_Bellamy Blake: Whichever one of you idiots is banging on my door can go float yourselves._

_Kyle Wick: Float ourselves?_

_Octavia Blake: Lol, autocorrect is a butch, hey bid brother?_

_Bellamy Blake: Clarke and I haven’t seen each other since new year’s._

_Bellamy Blake: We want some alone time._

_Bellamy Blake: Go away._

_Jasper Jordan: Oooohhhhh. Mom’s having sex everyone!_

_Clarke Griffin: …_

_Clarke Griffin: I have questions…_

_Lincoln Woods: No, you really don’t._

_Lincoln Woods: Trust me._

_Lincoln Woods: There’s not enough alcohol in the world to cleanse your mind after you get the answers._

_Lincoln Woods: My liver is still in recovery._

_Raven Reyes: Huh, that’s weird._

_Octavia Blake: No, not really, despite his size, Lincoln’s alcohol tolerance is pretty weak._

_Octavia Blake: It’s why he’s always ready to be our DD._

_Raven Reyes: Not what I was talking about._

_Jasper Jordan: Is it weird that mom is having sex with our new dad while messaging us?_

_Bellamy Blake: FFS_

_Bellamy Blake: We aren’t having sex!_

_Clarke Griffin: We aren’t?!_

_Monty Green: If both Clarke and Bellamy are messaging us, it’s safe to say they’re not having sex._

_Nate Miller: Or they’re having the most disconnected sex ever._

_Nate Miller: Though I know some gamers who tried sex and gaming at the same time, see if they could do both successfully…_

_Harper McIntyre: And?_

_Nate Miller: Negative, there were fatalities_

_Octavia Blake: In the game or irl?_

_Lincoln Woods: Feel free not to answer that question._

_Raven Reyes: You’re all idiots._

_Raven Reyes: What I meant was, if I can hear Monroe in the room next to me and the rest of us are on this chat, who is knocking on Bellamy and Clarke’s door?_

_Nate Miller: Ten bucks says serial killer_

_Jasper Jordan: I’ll take that action_

_Kyle Wick: I’m putting five on fan of Clarke’s_

_Clarke Griffin: Thank-you Wick._

_Clarke Griffin: But ten says Gina’s bitchy bridesmaid coming to kill Bellamy_

_Bellamy Blake: Clarke!_

_Clarke Griffin: Sorry. Hate the game, not the player._

_Clarke Griffin: But if I’m right, Harper McIntyre can we get Zoe to come save him?_

_Kyle Wick: Really? You aren’t gonna call on the six ft of solid muscle and intimidation?_

_Clarke Griffin: Pretty sure Lincoln subscribes to Ahisma_

_Jasper Jordan: Bless you._

_Octavia Blake: Buddhist virtue of nonviolence._

_Lincoln Woods: I am really good at diffusing situations with words though._

_Octavia Blake: Trust me, no-one could talk Roma out of a fight._

_Raven Reyes: Twenty says it’s Finn looking to get Clarke to perform or do something at the ceremony or reception._

_Clarke Griffin: Not happening_

_Octavia Blake: I’m gonna put ten on it being Gina coming to ask Bellamy to make sure we’re all on our best behaviour for the wedding_

_Bellamy Blake: Float you all to hell._

_Clarke Griffin: Betting’s closed, he’s going to answer the door._

* * *

 

“Gina.”

  
Bellamy glanced behind him as Clarke muffled her laughter in a pillow and he guessed that she was announcing the results of the betting pool even as he struggled to figure out what to say.

Gina stood there dressed in a maxi dress, patting her hands on her back where her pockets would be if she was wearing jeans,

  
“Gina,” she echoed, “Hoping to talk to you.”

He nods, swallowing and steps back allowing her to come into the room and her eyes dart to Clarke, the superstar lounging on the bed in orange Valentino track pants that she’d bought when Anya had complained that she didn’t wear enough designer clothes and his World’s Okay-est Brother sweater that Octavia had bought him for Christmas.

His basic understanding of fashion and colour schemes tells him that her outfit is clashing horribly, and she probably couldn’t wear it to the gym or outside without Anya having an aneurysm, but she hadn’t planned on anyone other than him seeing her.

Still, she only smiles when she sees Gina,   
  
  
“Hey, excited for tomorrow?”

Gina’s smile is a little forced, “Excited to get married,” she manages, “And hoping to speak to Bellamy.”

  
Bellamy is perched on the back of the couch, waiting for the conversation to begin but for some reason, after a moment of silence, Clarke hops off the bed, grabbing her phone and key,

  
“I’m gonna go play video games with Monty and Miller.” she announces, padding out of the room, which doesn’t help his confusion any.

“Everything okay?” he asks when the door closes on his girlfriend, “I know Clarke’s famous and everything, but she is my girlfriend and I did technically tell Finn I was bringing her back when he needed names for the table places.”

Gina wears a lopsided smile, “Roma has a few conspiracy theories about how you convinced a superstar to date you, from faking cancer to secret gambling addiction leading to massive debt.”

“Course she does,” He mutters, “You here to warn me?”

“Actually,” she begins, sitting down on the bed to face him, “I want to talk to you about Finn and Raven.”

“Nothing bad,” she adds hastily when she sees his hackles rising, “The exact opposite actually, I was hoping to convince Raven to be in Finn’s wedding party, as his best man.”

  
Bellamy grabs his phone and ignores the twenty messages he already has from his friends,

  
“The wedding is in less than twenty-four hours,” he points out, “How does he _not_ have a best man yet?”

“He kind of does,” Gina admits, “he chose his work buddies to be his groomsmen, he’s using the wedding to network, if everything goes well, he could be on fast-track for an important promotion in only six months instead of a year…”  
  


She trails off and Bellamy guesses that he wasn’t hiding his reaction well, or at all. 

  
“I forgot just how expressive your eyes were,” she sighs, “It’s not as bad as I’m making it out to be, really.”

“Remember when we discussed weddings?” he prompted, “You loved the idea of a casual wedding in a forest, simple and easy, mid-morning and with a barbeque or a pizza party afterwards.”

Gina shrugged, “Next wedding maybe.”

  
Despite the hotel being overpriced and pretentious, it did have the same basic amenities of other hotels, namely a box of tissues in the bathroom, which Bellamy is already grabbing a generous handful of when Gina starts to cry.

  
“I’m fine,” she mumbles, wiping her eyes but still taking the tissues, “I’m just tired…and emotional…and really, really hungry.”

He nods, “And?” he prompts,

“And Finn’s family are such… _assholes_ ,” she blurts out, “They’re so WASP-y, they probably read Uncle Tom’s Cabin and rooted for the slave owners, I honestly think his mom is pissed that they don’t have any antebellum roots, and she claims that their family came over on the Mayflower, but I checked the immigration records and they actually came over from Ireland during the potato famine. And they bought their house in the Hamptons during the GFC and lord it over my family for not having a Hampton’s beach house, but who the hell even goes to the Hamptons in _winter_? Which is the only time they go by the way…”

  
Bellamy only nods again, knowing that Gina isn’t looking for a conversation right now so much as she’s just looking to vent.

  
“And we’re at a freaking _ski resort_ in _Spring_ because my parents insisted that we make it a destination wedding because ‘Nowhere in Arkadia was nice enough’ for their friends- _their_ friends- to attend. Meanwhile, this wedding is costing a fortune and both our parents keep mentioned that to us even though pretty much everything was decided by them, the only control I had was picking my lingerie for the honeymoon but at this point, I actually think that his mom is going to come into our suite after the wedding and probably make some snide comment about how fat I look in the nightgown.”

  
He twists his mouth, remaining silent as he tries to plan a route off the mountain. How pissed off would Clarke be if he told her that he was cutting their time together short because he needed to help his ex-girlfriend escape his impending marriage.

Actually…

* * *

 

_Text Message_

_History Nerd: What would you say if I told you that I needed to get Gina off this mountain?_

_History Nerd: As in, away from Finn?_

_PC: Okay_

_PC: I can call Anya, she could organise a way out in two hours max._

_PC: And I can stay behind to make sure everyone else gets out without incident_

_History Nerd: I’ll keep you posted_

* * *

 

Clearing his throat, Bellamy crouches down before her and when she meets his eyes, he takes her hands, squeezing them gently.

  
“If you need a way out, just tell me,” he says, “We can figure something out, you can stay with me or Octavia until you get a place of your own and we can keep Finn away.”

A weak laugh escapes her, “You would do that, wouldn’t you?” she declares,

“You know, I’ve considered it once or twice,” she sighs, “When I’m really sad or hungry, but Bellamy…I truly love Finn. I know you don’t like him, and you think he’s a dick, but…he’s a good person when he’s with me and he makes me better too.”

  
Gina had already been pretty good when they’d been together, he hadn’t seen much room for improvement, but perhaps there was some part of her that she’d wanted to work on.

  
“He makes you happy?” he checks, “ _Actually_ happy?”

She nods, “Right now, we’re in a bad place but only because this isn’t our wedding so much as it is our parents event, but when it’s done and it’s just the two of us? I love him so much.”

  
Love must be blind then.

And deaf.

And demented.

  
He exhales and rocks back on his heels, “So, you want me to be the middle man for your conversation with Raven?”

She nods, wiping under her eyes with the tissues and blowing her nose, “I’ll just need a minute.”

Bellamy climbs to his feet and offers her his contact lens solution for her to dab in her eyes before leading her down one floor to where his friends were situated.

They step off the elevator and he almost immediately tripped over Lincoln’s long legs.

Bracing himself against the wall, he takes a moment before trying to assess the situation.

All his friends are in the hallway, sitting on the carpeted floor, steaming cups of tea and coffee dotted between their legs or beside them as they chat.

  
“I thought I said to get some rest,” he points out as Octavia lifts her legs to block his path, and he whacks at them with his hands,

“Are you being quiet at least?”

“We’re on our best behaviour mom,” Jasper announces, “Dad has been making sure of it.”

  
Clarke snorts into her cup and gives him a wave but otherwise turns her attention back to the card game she was playing with Miller.

Raven is sitting sideways, leaning back against Wick, her legs propped on Monty’s lap as he painted her toenails.

  
“You good, Reyes?” he asks sarcastically, “Can I get you anything? Some grapes? Blue lotus leaves? The calendar that our modern system is based on?”

She smirks and shifts against Wick, “Hey Bellamy, what contained all the knowledge in the world except how to put out a fire?”

Octavia laughs, and Bellamy breaths in through his nose, “We don’t joke about the library of Alexandria in this family.” He reminds her, and she flips him off with one perfectly manicured finger.

  
“Raven?” Gina called, “Can I speak with you for a moment?”

  
Raven has a hardened stare Bellamy hasn’t seen since her university days, when she frequently found herself being mansplained to about anything from car engines to spacecraft. Since she was now in a field populated by roughly five hundred people the world over, she was well-known to the point that nobody was stupid enough to assume she was the secretary or the diversity hire.

It’s a thousand-yard stare that he had hoped she would teach Octavia to scare off any potential suitors when Bellamy wasn’t there to put the fear of God into them.

Of course, judging from the fact that Octavia was now living with Lincoln and talking about matching tattoos, Raven apparently sucked as a teacher.

  
“Okay,” she decides, “Lift me by the elbows.”

  
Bellamy steps forward and helps her up, taking an extra second to make sure she was steady before she padded into Harper and Zoe’s bedroom, Gina following on her heels.

He lingers in the doorway until Gina gives him a little motion with her hands and he shuts the door behind him, waiting ten seconds before thumping hard on the wood and hearing the sound of eavesdroppers scuttling back in the hallway.

Raven has an inner-strength and confidence, so when she’s leaning against the wall it looks like she’s assessing Gina not like she’s resting her leg as much as possible before tomorrow.

  
“If this is some attempt to make sure I’m gonna behave myself tomorrow,” she begins,

“You better believe I’ll talk Jasper into objecting when the priest brings it up.”

  
Gina ducks her head, but Bellamy hears the humour in her voice,

  
“First thing I did when we found the celebrant was tell her not to ask for objections,” she explains, “And they’ve stopped doing it anyway, too much drama.”

“Actually,” she continues, “I’m here to ask you to go talk to Finn about being best man tomorrow.”

  
Raven’s eyebrows shoot up and she almost looks lost for words for the first time since Bellamy has known her.

  
“Two things, one- _why?_  two- if Finn wants me back in his life, why are you the one doing the asking?”

“Because, I don’t think Finn knew how to talk to you after your relationship ended.”

Raven snorts, “Last I heard, there was this terrific thing called texting, it’s where you type what you want to say and in some cases, send it to someone for free!”

“I think what Gina means,” Bellamy interjects, “Is after you slashed his tires.”

  
Which Bellamy had approved of at the time, especially because Raven had been working as a mechanic then and word had got around most of the local area that Finn wasn’t to be sold three new tires.

Raven only shrugs, “He broke my heart and I’m not going to apologize for my reaction.”

“I’m not asking you to,” Gina assures her, “Just…if things had been different, maybe if he’d been better, you would have been the love of his life, but even if you’re not, you’re still his family and in some way, I think his soulmate.”

  
A tick in her jaw, narrowed eyes and clenched fist is surprisingly what tells Bellamy that Gina’s appeal has been successful.

  
“Fine,” Raven sighs, “I’m going to go try talk some sense into him, but if I come across any of his uppity asshole relatives, I’m gonna throat-punch someone.”

Gina shrugs, “That’s fair.”

Bellamy stands back, “Want some company?” he offers as Raven goes past and she shakes her head with a sigh, “Nah, if I have someone to talk to I might just ramp myself up into a nut shot.”

  
And while he would pay to see that, he’s already shelled out enough for this wedding, so instead, he only goes as far as the hallway and sinks down beside Clarke, who leans into his side but doesn’t take her attention of Miller.

* * *

 

_Group Chat: Delinquents do a Wedding_

_Raven Reyes: Guess what losers, I’m Best Man now. Deal with it._

_Octavia Blake: Really?_

_Octavia Blake: How’d that conversation go, exactly?_

_Raven Reyes: I went to Finn’s room, walked in and said exactly what I just typed._

_Clarke Griffin: Good for you._

_Clarke Griffin: Assume the bachelor party has already been thrown?_

_Clarke Griffin: Because sourcing a stripper on the top of a remote mountain will be hard._

_Bellamy Blake: Raven can do anything she puts her mind to._

_Raven Reyes: Damn straight._

_Raven Reyes: Right now, I’m putting my mind to kicking Finn’s ass at Monopoly._

_Raven Reyes: Mercy is for the weak._

_Raven Reyes: And those who follow Asthma._

_Lincoln Woods: Ahisma._

_Lincoln Woods: But the trick to winning Monopoly is to stack your cards on top of one another so he loses track of what you own._

_Lincoln Woods: Don’t stop until there’s bankruptcy and tears._

_Bellamy Blake: …_

_Bellamy Blake: O, are you safe right now?_

_Octavia Blake: Only time I’ve ever been scared of Lincoln is when we were playing Game of Life._

 


	8. Ice Cold Awakenings and Responses

Saturday March 30th

 

_Group Chat: Delinquents do a Wedding_

_Kyle Wick: Guys, it’s 5am and Raven just woke me up, shouted ‘Best man, asshole’ and ran from the room._

_Kyle Wick: Literally, she ran._

_Kyle Wick: Everything I just typed was grammatically correct._

_Kyle Wick: I didn’t even know she had the capability to run like that after the accident._

_Kyle Wick: The brace doesn’t allow that range of movement._

_Kyle Wick: And now, I’m awake now and bored!_

_Lincoln Woods: Must be wedding day adrenaline_

_Kyle Wick: Why are you awake at this hour?_

_Bellamy Blake: Yeah Lincoln, why are you awake at this hour?_

_Lincoln Woods: I get up at 4:30 every morning, meditation and exercise._

_Lincoln Woods: Why are you up at this hour?_

_Clarke Griffin: Istg, he just sat up, mumbled something about Octavia and started checking social media._

_Clarke Griffin: I thought he was somnambulant._

_Lincoln Woods: Yeah that checks out._

_Bellamy Blake: I had a nightmare she was getting married, okay!_

_Lincoln Woods: …_

_Lincoln Woods: And so does that._

_Kyle Wick: Dude._

_Raven Reyes: Dick_

* * *

 

Bellamy Blake in a private message to Octavia Blake

_Bellamy Blake: I know it’s only seven am but if you’re awake, tell Lincoln I’m sorry_

_Octavia Blake: Okay…_

_Octavia Blake: Why?_

_Octavia Blake: OMFG!!! You asshole!!!_

_Bellamy Blake: It’s not him, O._

_Bellamy Blake: I’m just freaked out about the idea of you marrying anyone._

_Bellamy Blake: And we’re at a wedding._

_Bellamy Blake: People do dumb things at weddings!_

_Octavia Blake: Not that I have to justify my relationship to you._

_Octavia Blake: But marrying Lincoln would be the smartest move for me in so many ways._

 

* * *

 

  
Raven has never been in a wedding party before. She’d nearly been a bridesmaid for one of Finn’s cousins, but the mother had vetoed her being in because she didn’t ‘fit the theme’.

Raven had thought it was a race thing until she’d seen the bridal party and realised that the ‘theme’ was not outshining the bride on her wedding day.

She’s sure the bride had a lovely personality, but both she and the bridesmaids had such plain white-bread faces that gun to her head, Raven could not have picked them in a line-up.

So, she’s not sure if there’s a special way you’re supposed to wake up the groom on his big day.

But pouring a bucket of ice on his head does the trick.

Finn’s scream is shrill and he’s scrambling backwards, falling off the bed as Raven laughs,

“Classic.”

It takes him a few seconds to figure out what’s happening, and he runs a hand through his hair, laughing slightly,

“I’m gonna take a moment to be glad you didn’t have time to make a cattle prod from spare parts.” He says, chuckling, reaching for his phone,

“And now I’m gonna ask why you’re waking me up at this hour?”

Raven shrugged, “It’s your wedding day, if Gina has to be awake at this hour, so do you.”

Finn blinked a few times and tapped on his phone, “That’s fair I guess, you wanna get some breakfast?”

* * *

 

Finn had been the first boy she’d kissed, the only man she had had sex with until they’d broken up and she had seen an entire future for the two of them.

And she still sees that, as the two of them sit on the lounge chairs by the swimming pool, watching the sun rise as they wrap their hands around their coffee mugs, shivering in the cold morning air.

She knows that they’ll never kiss each other again, never have sex or wake up next to each other in the same bed, but she can see herself beside him at holidays, messaging him when she’s bored, catching up for coffee at least once a month.

She’s not sure how to put this into words, but Finn sips on his coffee, winces at the bitter taste and reaches over, his fingers wrapping around her wrist,

“Hey,” he murmurs, giving her a shy grin, “I know I screwed everything up, I’m an ass, but…if you’re willing to stick around, I’m gonna make it right between us eventually.”

She smirks and leans her head on his shoulder, “If I ever have kids, I’m gonna make you change so many diapers.”

“I love you.”

“I know.”

* * *

 

“Bell! The hotel is on fire!”

  
Clarke’s head shot up and her eyes found his as he huffed in exasperation,

  
“Door’s open, O!”

  
Octavia burst in, a whirlwind of energy, “Hi Clarke…are you dressed? That’s a dress, right?”

  
Clarke glanced down at her outfit, “It’s not what I’m wearing to the wedding, but yeah, it’s a dress.”

  
“Sweet,” she panted, turning to Bellamy, “Let me see your eyebrows.”

  
He smacks her hands away, “O, I may never say this again, but I think you should join Jasper for his morning smoke, you need to calm down.”

  
She huffs, and Bellamy sees Clarke smirk, “It’s the big day, Bell! The wedding is in _seven_ hours!”

  
Quickly she rounds on Clarke, “You’ve got a rough schedule for preparation, right?”

  
Clarke presses back into the couch with slight alarm in her eyes, but still manages to nod, “Bellamy and I will be ready.”

  
“Great,” she claps her hands, “Then let’s go! Breakfast time, I want to make sure everyone eats properly, so they don’t get drunk after one glass.”

  
When they don’t move as quickly as she hopes, she starts physically herding them from the room, Bellamy almost tripping into the hallway and colliding with Monty who grabs his arm to steady him. “She got you too, huh?”

  
He leans back and sees that both Monty and his boyfriend looked as if Octavia had literally dragged them out of bed. Jasper is even still wearing his sleeping mask instead of his goggles.

  
He scans the hallway but doesn’t see Lincoln and swallows the lump in his throat caused by his guilt.

  
“He’s downstairs,” Octavia answers before he can even ask the question, “To make sure we all actually get down there and don’t wander off between the elevator and the restaurant.”

  
“Smart move,” Clarke comments, as Bellamy glances down with a flush,

  
“You should be taking notes,” she teases, squeezing his hand, “Since it’ll be a few years before we’ve become enough of a dictatorship that you can microchip your friends.”

  
Bellamy rubs his thumb against her skin and she presses close to him as they descend in the elevator, the two of them standing in the back and enough attention is on Octavia that he can kiss her hair without any of his friends calling them out on it.

  
“Thanks.” He whispers in her ear and she looks up with a smirk,

  
“Anytime.”

  
He manages to snatch Jasper’s sleeping mask off his head and shove it into the back pocket of his jeans as the bell dings for the ground floor and he gets away with it because whatever response Jasper would have made is swallowed up by the doors opening.

  
“Chaos,” Lincoln declares, looking like he wants to step into the elevator,

  
“It’s like a madhouse.”

  
They can barely hear him over the activity taking place in the reception area, where endless vases of flowers are being marched in single formation by nearly identical uniformed staff, instructions are being shouted by Mrs Collins’ to a gaggle of family members, Mr Collins is in the corner, dressed in pastel golf clothes and laughing with a horde of eerily matched men, Roma is talking loudly into a phone and three teenage girls are taking photos right in the path between the elevators and the restaurant.

  
“It’s like a Black Friday sale,” Harper notes, linking her arm through Monroe’s,

  
“Whatever you do babe, don’t leave me behind.”

  
“I second that,” Jasper comments, taking Zoe’s other arm and looking to Bellamy,

  
“Can we just scream Clarke’s name and run for it?”

  
Before Bellamy can reply, Octavia claps her hands, “Okay, everyone off the elevator, we have a table reserved for us in the restaurant, under my name, you all have five minutes max to get there, go!”

  
Clarke laughs, a nervous smile gracing her lips, “It’s like the floor at Comic Con,” she tells him, “But here they’re roleplaying adults.”

  
Bellamy had never been to any of the cons and if this reminded his girlfriend of them, he had no intention of ever going.

  
Despite Lincoln being the taller and more muscled one in their relationship, his little sister is for some reason leading the group, and actually managing to clear a path with what he has to assume is sheer determination.

  
Monty and Miller are bringing up the rear, nearly getting cut off by another round of floral deliveries and knocked by some more golfing buddies who somehow remind Bellamy of Barbie dolls.

  
He hears his name and turns to see Roma standing with the teenage girls, glaring at him with absolutely fury and he is glad that he only has time to gesture to his friends before he’s through the restaurant doors and can breathe a sigh of relief.

  
A waiter sees them approach and pales slightly before Octavia gives her name and he sees her shoulders drop in relief, “Of course, Ms Blake, right this way.”

  
The waiter sees them all seated and hands them their menus, “And thank-you for making a reservation this morning.” He says, raising his voice so that it would carry before sweeping back to the kitchen and everyone who had worked in service hisses in sympathy,

  
Clarke looks around confused and Bellamy leans in, “A lot of people must have come in wanting large tables put together without calling ahead.” He explains, and she frowns,

  
“So?”

  
 “It can be a hassle when you’re trying to feed everyone and get drinks out, make your way around the room…” he trails off and she nods, though he doubts she understands the issue completely.

  
They all choose to eat from the breakfast buffet, heading to the various stations, with Miller handling their coffee orders at the machine and Octavia loading up plates with fruit to take back to the table to force feed them.

  
Bellamy gets stuck at the toaster trying to convince Jasper and Monty that just because chocolate croissants were literally on the table, didn’t mean that they could eat those exclusively.

  
He thinks he’s making headway when he hears a shrill voice calling across the room,

“Clari _ssa…_ Clari _ssa_.”

  
Clarke was at the dairy section, choosing flavoured yogurts and topping them with berries and mango sauce when her head shoots up and she starts looking for the source of the noise.

  
“ _Yoohoo!_ ” the shrill voice continues as the room starts to go quiet, “ _Clarissa_ _Glac-ier_.”

  
Bellamy frowned in concern and began making his way towards his girlfriend who had narrowed her eyes as she realised that she was the intended recipient of the summoning.

  
“Who is that?” Clarke asked him, her voice cold and prim,

  
“I don’t know,” he answered, putting down his plate so he could rest a hand on her lower back, “What do you want to do?”

  
He’s never been with her when she’s been approached by fans, so he’s not sure what the standard protocol is, but he keeps close as she finishes filling her plate and goes back to their table.

  
His friends don’t seem to know what to do either, and the responses are ranging from confused to tense, with fellow diners either trying to point surreptitiously at Clarke or figure out who Clarissa Glacier is.

  
A waiter approaches the woman, they converse in hushed tones and whatever she says must convince the staff member to walk her over to their table where Clarke is sipping on her coffee.

  
“ _Yes?_ ” she prompts, twisting in her seat but her posture is tense and unwelcoming.

  
The woman doesn’t even flinch, putting a hand to her pastel green twinset with her index finger resting underneath her oversized pearl necklace,

  
“I’m _Mrs_ Collins,” she announces grandly, “Mother of the _Groom!_ ”

  
She stretches out the word ‘groom’ until it resembles the sound a child makes when they’re playing with a car.

  
Clarke manages a tight smile, “Nice to meet you.”

  
She doesn’t offer anything more and the moment freezes, Mrs Collins clearly waiting to be asked what she wanted and Clarke simply staring her down.

  
Bellamy feels the awkward tension rising and sees Harper dropping her eyes in emphatic embarrassment for the interloper at their table.

  
Eventually, Mrs Collins clears her throat, “Well, as you know, my son is getting married today.”

  
“No shit.” Octavia mutters under her breath, and Bellamy smirks into his coffee.

  
“And we need music for the reception.” Mrs Collins finishes, and Bellamy has a sinking feeling in his stomach.

  
Clarke merely raises her eyebrows, “And, you want me to come up with a playlist?”

  
Mrs Collins gives a little laugh, “No, dear…don't be silly.”  
  
  
“As soon as we knew we were going to have a real performer here, we knew we just had to get you to sing a little song or two.”

  
Clarke’s coffee cup hit the table with a clatter and her confused expression is sickly sweet and fake to anyone who knew her,

  
“I’m sorry?” she stammers in feigned surprise, “I wasn’t aware I was going to perform; did you speak to my agent? Is she sending my instruments?”

  
Mrs Collins lips purse like she was sucking on a lemon and the glare she’s giving shows that, if nothing else, the upper part of her face hadn’t been botoxed yet.

  
“I wasn’t aware we had to officially book a guest.” She tried aiming for the same tone of innocent confusion as Clarke, but her audience was filled with those who’d endured every version of this kind of exploitation in hospitality and customer service and saw right through the act.

  
“Any professional providing a service at an event needs a contract,” Lincoln interjects, trying to be helpful, “For liability purposes, wages, so everyone is on the same page.”

  
“Besides,” Bellamy adds, “She didn’t bring any of her instruments with her.”

  
The gleam of satisfaction in Mrs Collins’ eyes is worrying enough, she reaches behind her, snapping her fingers expectantly and one of the hotel staff hands over a guitar that they’d been hiding behind their back.

  
“You play on guitars, yes?” she states, “Here.”

  
She pushes it towards Clarke who takes it gingerly, barely able to keep the despair off her face.

  
Bellamy has no knowledge of guitars or any musical instrument, but even he knows that movie stars who play in their spare time wouldn’t be using the same brand or whatever as someone who worked in customer service.

  
He wonders if it had just been sitting in the hotel or if Mrs Collins had demanded one be found from somewhere and this was what they could manage.

  
Clarke leans sideways, looking around the woman to the staff member,

  
“Do you mind if I tune it?” she asked, and the young man looks as if he can’t remember how to speak, only nodding and making a gargled noise in his throat.

  
Bellamy looks up and down the table to see that his friends are multitasking, eating their breakfast while watching the disaster in front of them.

  
He sips on his rapidly cooling coffee and checks his watch, wondering how far behind this would put them on his sister’s schedule.

  
Clarke strums the guitar strings, singing quietly under her breath, her voice rising and falling in what Bellamy guesses might be pitch as she tried to find…

  
He has no idea. She’s an actress and a model who likes to play music in her spare time, he can appreciate it when she sings in the shower, or sends him videos but otherwise, he’s a complete novice.

  
“I’m sorry,” she sighs, standing up to hand the guitar back to its owner, “I’ve never played with this model before, I haven’t prepared anything, and I wouldn’t be confident…”

  
“Don’t be stupid, dear,” Mrs Collins snaps, “A guitar is a guitar.”

  
Stupid?

  
The air around the table had been tense before, but now it goes positively frosty.

  
One of Clarke’s breakout roles had been in a science-fiction film where she had played an AI, she’d had to learn how to portray expressions with absolutely no emotion in her eyes.

  
She liked to bring it out whenever people irritated her because there was something terrifying about the vacant, dead-eyed stare.

  
“I’m _not_ a professional singer, I _don’t_ perform publicly, and I have absolutely _no_ equipment on hand, even if I wanted to, you’ve given me _no_ time to prepare and besides, I came here as a _guest_ …”

  
“A guest,” Mrs Collins echoes, “So you can consider it a present to _my_ son.”

  
“She already got a present for the bride and groom,” Octavia declares, “She put in for the wedding china.”

  
Mrs Collins scoffs, “Group presents are for poor people, a _real_ star could afford something decent. _Cheap_ is _tacky_.”  
  


“Welp,” Monty says, clapping his hands on the table as he stood, “This has been fun, but I think we all had something to do far away from this…” he waves his hand vaguely,

  
“Shit show?” Wick suggests and Bellamy smirks as they all stood up and he took his girlfriend’s hand, linking their fingers together as they began making their way to the door.

  
“If you refuse to do this one _little_ thing,” Mrs Collins shouts, actually stomping her foot,

  
“Then I’ll have no choice but to tell all the papers about what a _diva_ you really are!”

  
Clarke looks over her shoulder, “Then I’ll have my lawyers sue you into bankruptcy for defamation.”

  
Bellamy wants to make a path to the elevator banks but Clarke tugs on his hand and leads him outside to the back of the hotel, under the shadows of a balcony where she turns around and presses her face to his chest, wrapping her arms around his waist and taking long deep breaths, her exhalations warm on his shirt.

  
“You okay?” he asks, and she nods,

  
“She’s not the first person to come out of the woodwork and demand I do something for them, usually it’s people asking for money or for me to give their script or work to someone and she’s not the first person to threaten to lie to the paps about me, but…right now, my reputation is Hollywood’s Golden Girl, once that becomes tarnished, it doesn’t matter how good an actor I am, I’ll be done.”

He has nothing to say to this, he can’t even begin to relate, but he can stand there and provide her with the support she needed until she felt safe again.

 


	9. In Which Octavia Becomes the Commander

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story is getting a lot longer than I anticipated

Saturday March 30th

 

_Group Chat: Delinquents do a Wedding_

_Octavia Blake: Okay losers, it’s **12:30** , I want everyone ready by **2:30**._

_Octavia Blake: And I don’t mean, ‘just have to put my shoes on’ ready._

_Octavia Blake: I mean I want your asses by the elevator._

_Bellamy Blake: Wedding is at three-thirty, O._

_Octavia Blake: It starts at 3:30, which means we need to be there at **3:00.**_

_Kyle Wick: Do we really need thirty minutes to get from the elevator to the wedding?_

_Kyle Wick: I mean, I know we’re bad but are we really that bad?_

_Raven Reyes: Suck it assholes, I’ve been ready for hours._

_Raven Reyes: And I look freaking awesome!_

_Raven Reyes: Right now, I’m making the other groomsmen cry like little boys._

_Raven Reyes: They suck at poker._

_Harper McIntyre: Do we not want to be as freshly made-up as possible before heading down?_

_Octavia Blake: No, rookie mistake. You need time to figure out how the outfit works and get used to the make-up._

_Monty Green: Okay, but we aren’t about to go on stage before thousands of people._

_Octavia Blake: Aren’t we?_

_Clarke Griffin: She’s right. We need time to get comfortable in our outfits, figure out where our shoes pinch, what make-up we need to reapply, make sure our hair styles don’t get ruined quickly etc._

_Zoe Monroe: I’ll need the full two hours just to get into my dress uniform._

_Harper McIntyre: You’ll need the full two hours just to pin all your medals to your chest._

_Bellamy Blake: …._

_Bellamy Blake: Well, I thought that was gonna turn dirty but apparently, we can be mature adults. Congrats everyone!_

_Nate Miller: No, they just took it off chat._

_Nate Miller: And now they’re screwing._

_Lincoln Woods: So, anyone who is ready early can come hang out in our room._

_Bellamy Blake: So, my sister can give the seal of approval?_

_Jasper Jordan: Is this even the real Lincoln or did Octavia steal his phone?_

_Raven Reyes: Hey, assholes, whoever looks hottest gets all my winnings from the next round of poker._

* * *

 

“You can do better, Bell.”

  
Bellamy whacked his sister’s hand away and checked himself in the bathroom mirror for what had to be the hundredth time in the last two hours.

  
“Honestly, O, I think you’re wrong,” he says, stepping back and shrugging, “This is as good as I’m ever going to look.”

  
He washes his hands and braces himself before uncapping his contacts cases, squirting the solution in his eyes to moisten them before using his index finger to catch the first lens.

He deliberately kept his left index fingernail short, so he wouldn’t pierce or scratch the lens, which Jasper had declared the nerd nail before muttering under his breath about cocaine nails.

Not that Bellamy would know but alarmingly, Clarke and Lincoln had laughed, clearly getting the reference.  
  


“You’re looking amazing though.” he tells his sister who only rolls her eyes even as her lips twitch,

“Of course, I look amazing, I’ve actually been preparing for this day.”

  
He rolls his eyes, declares himself done and walks into the bedroom to find Clarke sprawled on their bed.

He knew she and Anya had picked the dress with two main criteria- Did Clarke look good in it? Could it stand up to being worn while Clarke lolled about on furniture before or during the event?  
  


“You look beautiful.” he tells her, and she grins, “I should, I’m here to make you look good after all.”

“And because you’re my girlfriend and I want to spend time with you.” he added, but got no response as she stood up and did a quick twirl,

“How do I look?” she asked his sister, who narrowed her eyes in appraisal but nodded,

“Good.”

“Now, I’m going to go check everyone else, but when I say it’s time to go, it’s time to go,” Octavia announces, as she backs slowly towards the door, “I mean it.”

  
Bellamy saluted, got the bird in response and waited until the door had clicked into place before exhaling, hands in his suit pockets as he turned to Clarke.

  
“How exactly are we supposed to kill the next ninety minutes?”

She smirked, “Well, my first response to that would get us both in trouble with your sister. In fact, I’m not sure we can even kiss until we’re downstairs.”

  
Bellamy hadn’t been planning to kiss Clarke, at most they would have shared a quick peck before leaving the hotel room, but now that he knew he couldn’t kiss her?

All he could think about was how soft her lips looked and how good she would feel in his arms.

She glances down at his lips and giggles, “Yeah, we made a mistake.”

  
Huffing, she holds out her hand, and he slides his fingers slowly against her palm, drawing her hand to his lips and kissing her knuckles.

  
“God, I hate how much I want to get you naked right now,” She groans, “We should go find your friends.”

Those two parts of the sentence seemed contradictory and he quirks an eyebrow, “Really?”

“I want your sister to like me, I don’t want your friends to think I’m a diva and turning up late to a wedding because we were having sex doesn’t achieve either of those things. Safety in numbers, Bellamy.”

  
Having one of the most beautiful women in the world admit that she’s lusting after him doesn’t hurt his ego any, and he’s still smirking when they reach Lincoln and Octavia’s room.

Monty and Miller are already there, Miller sitting against the wall with Monty between his legs, his back against his chest, both of them on their phones playing a game.

Lincoln comes out of the bathroom, doing his tie perfectly without even glancing down, he gives them a nod,   
  
  
“Octavia is either chatting with Jasper or dressing him against his will.” He informs them.

  
His camera is spread out over the coffee table as he cleans it and Clarke leads him over to the couch, practically sitting on his lap as she talks with him about the parts and different types of equipment.

Bellamy’s phone vibrates, and he pulls it out to see a selfie of Raven with Finn, both grinning stupidly at the camera.

It makes him think of Gina and wonder how she’s handling the day so far, if she needed to talk to someone who wasn’t as emotionally invested in the event as the families seemed to be.

  
“I’m thinking of checking in with Gina,” he whispers in Clarke’s ear, “Make sure she’s okay.”

Clarke hums in thought, shifting slightly against him, “Maybe? But the last thing she’ll probably want today is guests wandering into her room when she’s trying to get ready, especially if Roma decides to make a scene, she can text if she needs you.”

  
He hears the logic in what she’s saying but concern lodges in his brain.

  
“Are you okay with this?” he asks when Lincoln moves away, “Me worrying about my ex?”

Clarke takes his hand, opening it up to kiss his palm, “Do you know how many girls and women have flirted with you since we’ve started dating?”

He shakes his head, “Thirteen that _I_ know of,” she answers, “And you’ve noticed exactly _zero_ of them, because you have what Harper called ‘relationship tunnel vision’ and I call loyalty. So, I’m okay with it, because worrying about people is what you do, Bellamy and even if you suddenly decided to break up with me and run away with Gina, no bride who runs away on her wedding day- after a decent engagement period- is someone who’ll stick around when the dust settles. So, you’d come back to me and I’d kill you with my bare hands, but I’d still love you.”

He leans back, slightly awestruck by her faith in his loyalty, “I’m never going to cheat on you,” he swears, “Or break up with you.”

She rests her hand on his chest, over his heart, “I know.”

  
Their moment is interrupted by Harper swanning into the room, her arms raised in triumph,

  
“I take less time to get ready than a soldier!” she exclaims, “The woman I love can evacuate an embassy in five hours flat but can’t do her hair in under thirty.”

  
Any response is cut off by the sounds of muffled shouting. Bellamy can only just recognise Octavia’s voice.

  
“Is my sister arguing with that same soldier right now?” he asks cautiously and Harper smirks,

“Oh yeah, she wants her to re-position her medals so they colour-coordinate.”

* * *

 

_Text Message:_

_World’s Okay-est Brother: Maybe don’t piss off the woman who shoots people for a living?_

_World’s Okay-est Sister: Not my fault the military can’t properly co-ordinate a war or medal placements._

_World’s Okay-est Brother: You have any playlist preferences for your funeral?_

* * *

 

Kyle comes in scratching the back of his neck, “Damn suit always gives me a rash.”

Bellamy sighs and slowly moves Clarke off his lap, “Come here, your tie is a disaster and my sister is in a fighting mood.”

  
Kyle leans over him while Bellamy undoes the tie and works it into something less disastrous.

  
“Thanks, man.”

He takes out his phone and checks the time, “No last-minute issues? Collins family drama? Attempts to blackmail Clarke or Lincoln into working? Sudden increase in expenses for us or the wedding?”

“There’s still an hour and ten minutes until the ceremony,” Clarke teased, “Plenty of time for something crazy to happen.”

“Shush,” Bellamy cut her off by stealing a kiss, “No testing fate.”

“Hey!” Octavia shouted from the door, “Don’t kiss Clarke, she’ll have to reapply her lipstick.”

“Worth it,” Clarke hums, but when Octavia pointedly clears her throat, she pulls back with a sigh,

“I’ll go reapply.”

“Thank-you!”

  
At two-twenty exactly, Octavia orders them from the room, not even Lincoln is granted leniency and she examines each of them thoroughly, getting so close to Monty that Bellamy was tempted to throw a condom at them.

  
“Okay, turns out I do get jealous over my boyfriend,” Miller comments, “Good to know, I guess.”.

Octavia rolls her eyes but turns to Jasper, “Hand it over,”

  
With a pout, Jasper reaches into his jacket pocket and hands her a joint.

  
“And the _other_ one,” She prompted, getting another joint from his back pocket.

“And the _other_ one.”

When she has six joints in her hand, she opens her clutch and drops them inside, “You can have them back at the reception.”

  
She points at them with her index finger and looks so much like their mother in that moment that Bellamy is having flashbacks to when he was five-years-old,   
  
  
“Don’t think I’ve overlooked the flasks,” she cautioned,

“No drinking during the wedding, if we get messy it reflects badly on Bellamy and Raven. Remember, we’re here to make them look absolutely awesome.”

“And to watch two people declare their love for one another,” Monty points out, “Very expensively I might add.”

Octavia rolled her eyes, “Yay for them, get your asses in the elevator.”

“You missed your calling as a general.” Monroe told her as they filed in, Clarke leaning against the back wall and taking Bellamy’s hand. 

“I’m good where I am.” Octavia answered primly, and Lincoln chuckled,

“You’ve never seen her mentor younger dancers, it’s both terrifying and amazing to behold.”

  
The look Octavia gives Lincoln, the pure delight and love makes Bellamy’s heart clench, in that moment, they’re the only people in their own little world and all that matters to them is each other.

They share a secret smile before she turns her attention to Monty and Jasper, and Bellamy notices the gentle brushing of Clarke’s thumb against his wrist. He glances over his shoulder and she sticks her tongue out at him.

* * *

  
When they reach the ground floor, they find that the chapel and the reception hall are at the far end of the building to the hotel rooms and they follow the gold embossed signs down a hallway.

And another hallway.

And another.

And _another_.

“Are we still in Mt Weather?” Wick groused, “We have to be halfway home at this stage.”

They have yet to encounter another soul as they walk along the identical beige wall and wooden floorboard halls and with the afternoon sun shining brightly in the clear blue sky, the situation begins to feel dreamlike.

Bellamy’s even beginning to feel a little freaked out when they hear noise up ahead and he picks up the pace to nearly run into a young woman.

He startles her, and she drops something, a loud clatter on the floor,

  
“ _Shit_ , sorry.” He apologises, blushing as he looks around for it only to find Jasper picking it up.

“It’s fine,” she says, her voice raspy, “It’s nice to see other people actually, I was beginning to think I was the only person here.”

Jasper steps around him and holds out what Bellamy sees to be an asthma pump, “Here.”

She smiles shyly at him, “Thanks.”

“Are you okay?” Lincoln asked, and she nods, “Yeah, I’m just taking a breather,” she explains, holding it up, “Literally.”

Jasper chuckles, “So, you here for the wedding or just really lost?”

“Wedding,” she answers, “If I ever get there.”

  
Clarke is tugging on Bellamy’s hand and he feels her weight shifting, pulling on his arm and he glances at her to see her eyes darting up the hallway pointedly, to where Octavia and Lincoln were slowly and quietly walking away.

Miller and Monty are next, Kyle following with a smirk and he finally figures out why they’re leaving Jasper alone in the hallway with a pretty woman.

  
“You’re so lucky you’re pretty.” Clarke whispers as they finally reach the waiting area and he lifts her hand to spin her under his arm, pulling her against him and kissing her hair.

“Love you too.”

  
They’re a large group, and the area already has a few people in it so Lincoln shuffles them to the windows, out of the way for the other guests.

He’s looking around for the photographer when the door to the chapel opens and Raven sticks her head out, grinning when she sees them.

She’s wearing flared silk pants that cover her leg brace and a matching red top that looks stunning and the sheer joy and excitement in her face makes her irresistible to watch.

  
“You look amazing.” Clarke gushes as she comes over to check them all out,

“Looking good yourself.” She nods to her before jerking her head to Bellamy, “Secret meeting, now.”

  
He wants to argue her understanding of a secret meeting but follows her to the opposite corner of the room, trying his best not to notice the way the smarmy white guy they’d seen two days ago is eyeing up Raven.

He can’t tell whether he wants to sleep with her or cut her open and eat her entrails.

  
“Everything okay on your end?” he asks her, and she nods,

“Yep, and I have a message for you from Gina. She says she’s good, you can relax and there’s no need to check on her.”

He rocks back on his heels and contemplates the missive, “So…am I that predictable or is she just telepathic now?”

“Predictable as the sun rising, old man,” Raven teases, “But I also checked on her because I heard enough from Finn to figure you’d want to make sure she was okay.”

He nods, “Thanks.”

She bumps his shoulder with her own, “I have to head back inside, but remember, if the priest calls for objections, stay quiet, Gina is fine with marrying Finn.”

“Better her than me.” He mutters under his breath and Raven snorts,

“Come on, old man Blake, _let’s do_ _this_!”

 


	10. Never Propose at Someone Else's Wedding

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know, this chapter got away from me a bit there.

Saturday March 30th

 

_Group Chat: Delinquents do a Wedding_

_Jasper Jordan: If a marriage ceremony isn’t tweeted, instagrammed and facebooked by the audience, then is it truly witnessed?_

_Bellamy Blake: Turn off your damn phone or the only thing people will be tweeiting is your funeral!_

_Harper McIntyre: You misspelled tweeting._

_Clarke Griffin: Guys, Bellamy has a protruding vein and a murder-y look in his eye,_

_Clarke Griffin: I think we better go radio silent._

_Jasper Jordan: But…how will I live without Monty?!!!!!!????!!!!_

_Nate Miller: You mean the guy sitting right next to you?_

_Nate Miller: My boyfriend?_

_Nate Miller: The one you’re holding hands with?_

_Zoe Monroe: Wow, I did not know Bellamy’s skin could go that deep a red._

_Octavia Blake: You assholes have three seconds to put your phones away._

_Harper McIntyre: Or what?_

_Octavia Blake: Two seconds._

_Kyle Wick: You don’t scare us._

_Zoe Monroe: Yes, she does._

_Octavia Blake: One second._

* * *

 

In almost perfect unison, his friends looked up from their laps, tucked their phones into their respective pockets or clutches and they raised their heads with feigned innocence.

Bellamy had warned them, under pain of literal death not to have their phones out or on during the ceremony.

  
“If you want photos that badly, you can ask Gina for copies.”

  
He would have confiscated them all as well, but his suit pockets weren’t deep enough to hold that many devices.

He exhales through his nose and reaches over, taking Clarke’s hand and squeezing it gently.

Their group had managed to make it to the front of the crowd and through the door early, so they’d snagged an entire sixth row pew and two seats in the fifth which Monty had shuffled Jasper into once he’d seen Maya sitting down there.

They couldn’t have got closer, there were gold papered signs with beautiful calligraphy stating that the first four rows were reserved, and an usher was actually standing there with a clipboard to screen those approaching.

Mrs Collins is sitting in the first row, a monstrosity of a hat on her head and her nose so far in the air that he was honestly surprised she could see anything but the windows. She was watching the usher with an air of pride, as only the select few were allowed to sit in the hallowed reserved seating.

She spots Clarke and the rest of them and her smug look turns positively nasty as she gives a loud sniff and high-pitched hum of derision before pointedly turning her back on them.

  
“Basic bitch.” Octavia mutters, causing Bellamy to smirk as Maya twists in her seat,

“She’s my aunt,” she reveals, and his sister is blushing with embarrassment when the other girl smiles,  
  
“It’s fine, she actually told me I wasn’t allowed to sit with the family in case I had an asthma attack and ruined the ‘vibe’.”

  
Bellamy only met this girl a moment ago, but he wants to scoop her up into a comforting hug and tell her that she’s not defined by her physical health.

But Jasper takes the lead on this one by being appropriately horrified on her behalf and giving him the freedom to study the other guests.

A lot were wearing ridiculous headpieces that looked like nesting birds and there were a lot of tans that couldn’t be natural considering how far they were from summer, heels high enough that these women would easily be towering over Jasper and he’s honestly impressed that the wearers managed the long trek from the hotel reception.

The way Roma had been bragging about the bridesmaids’ dresses had left Bellamy nervous that he and his friends would wind up looking like the poor relations but one of the benefits of having had a seamstress for a mother, Bellamy and Octavia actually knew fashion etiquette for weddings.

As opposed to many of the guests who were wearing evening suits or black dresses.

Short black dresses.

Short and tight and…

His eyes dart away as the blonde woman in the black sequined dress gives him bedroom eyes and Clarke clears her throat pointedly at her.

  
“If I’d known there were going to be so many cougars here, I’d have brought a tranq gun.” She mutters darkly, and he chuckles, pressing his lips to her temple.

“Why do you have a tranq gun?” he asks, and she rolls her eyes, “I don’t…yet, but you’d be amazed at what people are willing to source for me.”

  
He wants to delve into that, really, he does, but one of the side doors are opening and Finn walks through with Raven at his side.

At first glance, it looks like she’s wearing a full length sleeveless pale gold gown, until she shifts her stance just enough to show that it was a romper. Her smile is radiant as she takes her place, reaching over to straighten the flower in Finn’s lapel, chatting away to the groom and while there are camera phones flashing and clicking around them, they seem lost in their own little world.

At least until the string quartet starts to play and the double doors open to reveal the bridesmaids.

The bouquets they’re holding hide a decent portion of their dresses and what’s left is so complicated, Bellamy’s knowledgeable eyes dart away quickly so that he doesn’t have to try and figure out the chiffon, lace, pearl and…are those diamantes?

He senses eyes upon him and looks up to exchange a wordless glance of disbelief with his sister.

If he didn’t know any better, he’d accuse the bridesmaids of trying to upstage the bride.

Especially Roma who is flicking her hair like this is a Pantene commercial.

Unfortunately, cream isn’t really the right colour for any of these women, especially when their fake tans are bottle orange and if it wasn’t for Finn acting as a block between them and Raven, she would easily pull focus.

Growing up with a seamstress for a mother and a younger sister who had used his laptop to watch make-up tutorial videos had taught him a lot about make-up, colours and tones.

But people are standing up now and the music is starting up again and…

Wow.

Gina’s face was _radiant_.

She was pale and there were bags under her eyes, but she had her quirky amused smile on, as if there was something hilarious only she knew about. She catches his eye as she walks past, her father on her arm and winks at him, making him smirk as she picked up the pace.

Finn descends the steps, looking like he fully intends to meet her halfway down the aisle before Raven catches him by the neck of his tux and tugs him back, causing a few titters of amusement.

Her father hands her off, Gina looks at the bouquet in her hands and glances at the audience before tossing it to Raven who fumbles but manages to catch it with a quick laugh.

The priest clears his throat, “Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today…”

In front of them, Mrs Collins holds up her tablet to record the ceremony.

* * *

 

_Group Chat: Delinquents do a Wedding_

_Clarke Griffin: Where is everyone?_

_Zoe Monroe: Monty and Miller are taking a romantic stroll outside. Lincoln is taking photos of Bellamy and Octavia. Wick is at the bar trying to fend off Raven’s would-be suitors. Jasper is meeting Maya’s father, which is fast, and Raven is doing wedding photos. and Harper is having a conversation with her old grade school teacher._

_Zoe Monroe: Who has thirty seconds to stop glaring at me._

_Clarke Griffin: I swear I looked down at my phone for like three seconds and everyone vanished._

_Bellamy Blake: Welcome to my life._

_Clarke Griffin: Well, Mrs Collins is hunting me down and some dude-bro just aimed his phone at my breasts, so any time you want to return to my life Bellamy Blake, door’s open._

_Jasper Jordan: I see you Clarke, I’ll run interference._

* * *

“Why are we doing this?!” Octavia huffed in annoyance as she dropped her shoulders,

“Because you two are family and need more photos together,” Lincoln explained as he lined them up against a wall, “Pretend you’re happy, functional siblings for another sixty seconds.”

“Thirty.” Bellamy countered, smiling in automatic preparation for the picture.

“Forty.” Lincoln offered, stepping back slightly and holding up the camera,

“Thirty-five.” Octavia said, and the two of them share another cheeky glance.

“And I’m done,” he declares, lowering the camera and looking to the reception hall,

“That was fast,” his sister teases, striding right into his personal space.

“No, I’m done with all this,” he re-joined, slinging an arm around her shoulders and kissing the top of her head, “I’m running away to go live on an…oil rig.”

“And do what?” Bellamy challenged, “Take photos of metal?”

“Not be glared at by wrinkly old people who look like they call the Civil War, the Attack of Northern Aggression.” He mutters, keeping his voice low as one such old man eyed Octavia judgementally.

  
Bellamy hummed sympathetically and followed them into the hall, scanning the ornately laid tables with the massive centrepieces for their friends.

One of the troubles with having a large group of very close friends is that when they went out together they tended to forget about the people around them, and if he wasn’t there to remind them to use indoor voices, they could get a little loud and draw too much attention.

Which is how he finds them, they’re the table in the corner, near one of the side doors, so far away from the wedding party he’ll be surprised if they get their entrees before the cake is cut.

Harper is laughing as Jasper tells a joke, Zoe rolling her eyes and Clarke beaming just a little too brightly, which means they’re hamming it up to show off Jasper’s attractive qualities to Maya.

Bellamy’s not sure if it’s his love for his friends that makes them shine bright or if the reception is just falling a little short in comparison.

Certainly, they’re attracting attention.

Or Clarke is anyway.

Some of the guests are trying to be subtle, but some aren’t even bothering, stretching up out of their seats to take photos of her. Bellamy deliberately positions himself, standing by her chair and blocking her from view. She tilts her head back, gazing up with a smile and he should have thought about what memories this would bring to the forefront of his mind.

  
“I don’t dance,” she blurts out suddenly and he strokes her hair back from her face, “Sorry if that’s a deal breaker.”

He chuckles, “These are my friends,” he replies, jerking his chin at the table, “Sorry if that’s a deal breaker.”

  
A few of them boo and Jasper throws a bit of bread roll at him, which he catches quickly and chews on, suspecting that his friends might have started drinking before they started eating.

Maybe Octavia had figured the reception was her finish line, awarded herself and begun celebrating?

Maybe he should just stop worrying and enjoy himself.

Especially because Clarke’s walking two fingers across his knee, her eyes flickering to his before darting away again, her face a perfect portrayal of innocence as her hand starts moving north instead of south.

Gina and Finn’s first dance is to some old song that Bellamy has vaguely heard of but gun to his head wouldn’t be able to name. Finn spends the entire time smiling at Gina, stopping only long enough to steal kisses. And when Gina dances with his father, Finn tugs Raven onto the dance floor, the two of them more interested in chatting and laughing than dancing properly.

Clarke refuses point blank to set foot on the dance floor and hits the bar with Wick while Gina snatches Bellamy up.

  
“Having fun?” she asks, the two of them shuffling together as her eyes sparkle with happiness and lots of champagne,

“Yeah,” he answers, with surprising honesty, “You?”

“I’m married to the man I love, I get to go on holiday and I’m feeling pretty chill considering how stressful weddings are,” She responds, “Never get married on a mountain.”

He chuckles, “I don’t think I’ll be getting married anytime soon.”

She tilts her head in consideration, “You and Clarke are good though, right?”

“Yeah,” he answers, the word coming out shot and fast because he can’t answer without smiling, “She’s met all the important people in my life and not run away screaming, and we’re about to spend a month living together.” He tells her, “We’re doing great.”

“I’m happy for you.” She sighs, her eyes darting to Finn who was enduring a dance with an older woman.

“I’m happy for you.” He echoes, glad that he had endured all the crazy chaos leading up to this event if it meant knowing that Gina was okay.

The song is winding down and she trails her hands down his shoulders, squeezing his fingers before releasing him as she stepped back, 

“If you want to sneak away to have wedding sex with your hot girlfriend,” she whispers,

“I’ll forgive you.”

He chuckles, “Thanks but no thanks, there’s enough phones in here that TMZ would see her undressed before I did.”

  
Her response is lost in the bright flash of a camera and, being camera shy, Bellamy turns away, hands in his pockets, meandering over to the bar before he’s even put much thought into his escape.

He finds his girlfriend trapped between two men while having a selfie taken and she’s smiling but he can see how thin her lips are and read the annoyance in her eyes.

  
“There you are,” he exhales, holding out his hand for her, “I thought you’d snuck off with Monty and Jasper.”

  
She shakes her head, barely even wincing when one of the guy’s phones flashes barely two inches from her face,

  
“And interrupt their moment of true devotion? Figured I’d slum it with you instead.”

  
She goes to step away from the two men only to be caught when one of them doesn’t immediately remove his hand from her waist and Bellamy can barely see the bar behind them for all the waving red flags.

  
“Sorry,” Clarke laughs, her tone only a touch higher than normal, “Date duty calls.”

  
He thinks that only he can read the panic in her voice, but it’s as if there’s a signal there he’s not picking up on because suddenly every woman at the bar pauses and looks to Clarke. Even the female bartender has slowed down, still mixing drinks but keeping close to the sink in case she suddenly needed to move.

The man is scowling, his lip curling but Clarke gives a tug on her dress and pulls away, nearly tripping over her heels as she collides against Bellamy, slipping her arm through his and letting him steer her away.

  
“You okay?” he asks quietly, and she nods, rolling her eyes,

“Nothing I haven’t dealt with before.”

  
He wants to point out that that doesn’t negate the experience, but Octavia is marching across the room with laser focus, cutting a path and people are taking one look at her eyes and jumping out of the way.

  
“Bathroom break.” she demands, grabbing Clarke’s hand and despite the fact that she’s probably a little lighter than his girlfriend, seems to be pulling her almost off her feet. Clarke laughs and manages a wave to him as Harper, Zoe and Maya trail along in their wake, Raven already lingering at the door.

  
Resigning himself to a solid half hour before he saw his girlfriend again, Bellamy took a breath, told himself to stop being a dick and went in search of Lincoln.

He finds him at a window, looking outside at the moonlit grounds with a longing that has Bellamy momentarily wishing he cared as much about nature as the man in front of him.

  
“Having fun?” he offers as an opening, and Lincoln eyes him but turns his shoulder slightly in welcome.

“Tossing up whether or not Octavia and I can risk a walk in woods that we don’t know well at night.”

“In her heels?” Bellamy asks, “She breaks her ankle that’s on you.”

  
There’s a hint of a smile now but whatever his response would have been is lost in the screech of a microphone a someone starts shouting for everyone’s attention.

Wincing at the volume, they turn to see a young man with more hair product than actual hair and a suit almost too expensive to be tasteful holding the microphone too close to his mouth.

  
“Roma, _baby_ ,” he begins, and Bellamy shares a look of dread with Lincoln, “Come up here beautiful.”

 Roma is holding her hand to her chest, her eyes wide with feigned surprise as she swishes forward, and he has a moment where he contemplates whether he could tackle someone to the ground or hit the lights to stop what’s about to happen.

* * *

 

_Group Chat: Delinquents do a Wedding_

_Bellamy Blake: SOS!!!_

_Bellamy Blake: Roma’s boyfriend is proposing to her._

_Harper McIntyre: At someone else’s wedding???????????_

_Harper McIntyre: Are you joking?!!!!!!!!!!!!_

_Jasper Jordan: He is NOT._

_Bellamy Blake: We have to stop this!_

_Nate Miller: Monty just ran back inside, I think he’s going to kill the mike._

* * *

 

“Roma being here with you today, made me realise just how special our love is, more true, it’s the only real thing in a world full of posers.”

* * *

 

_Group Chat: Delinquents do a Wedding_

_Monty Green: Dammit, that mike is battery operated and I can’t find the speakers._

_Kyle Wick: This is the most painful thing I’ve ever witnessed._

_Raven Reyes: Me too. And I’m including my car crash in that list._

_Raven Reyes: Oh my God, is he really calling their love the only real thing at SOMEONE ELSE'S wedding?!_

_Clarke Griffin: Yeah, I’m not coming out of the bathroom until this is over._

_Zoe Monroe: Good call. I see enough disasters when I’m on tour, I don’t need to witness them when I’m at home._

_Octavia Blake: Roma doesn’t have a boyfriend. I’m scanning her social media right now and there’s…_

_Octavia Blake: They broke up three months ago._

_Bellamy Blake: Well they just got back together._

* * *

 

The man drops down to one knee and Roma is already shrieking yes before he flips open the box to reveal a piece of jewellery that’s more rock than actual ring.

Some of the people in the crowd manage to coo or shout in excitement but the applause is mostly lacklustre.

Roma and the man whose name Bellamy will probably never bother learning share a kiss that he’s pretty sure is inappropriate for anyone underage to witness and then break apart triumphantly, looking around expectantly for the crowd of well-wishers.

Nobody moves.

Bellamy scans the room and sees Finn at the bar, leaning back against it with a drink in hand and an eyebrow raised, clearly not planning to move and help the couple who had just stolen the spotlight at his own wedding.

Until Gina begins edging around the tables, picking up her dress so that it doesn’t catch, smiling and murmuring politely, until she reaches the dance floor and beams, sweeping across it to wrap her arms around Roma, hugging her tightly. Finn is at her side a moment later, shaking hands with the man and Bellamy still considers him a jerk but he has to respect him for being the better man in this situation.

  
“When you propose to Octavia,” he begins, keeping his voice light, “If you do it publicly, _that’s_ the bar you have to clear for it to be acceptable.”

  
It’s not the apology he deserves, but Lincoln accepts it with grace.

  
“If I did a public proposal, Octavia would turn me down on principle.”

  
That was true, his sister loved attention but on her own terms and the idea of being emotionally held hostage in such a way would infuriate her and cause her to lash out.

  
“Don’t worry,” Lincoln continues before Bellamy has to decide how far to take this hypothetical situation,

“When Octavia and I decide to get married, we’ll have Valium on hand for you.”

“That’s all I ask.” He responds, letting the conversation run its natural course.

* * *

 

_Text Message:_

_Octavia Blake: Where you at?_

_Octavia Blake: They’re throwing the bouquet._

_Octavia Blake: Again_

_Octavia Blake: My brother isn’t here either_

_Octavia Blake: Ewwwwwww_

_Clarke Griffin: See you tomorrow!_

* * *

 


	11. The Weather outside is frightful

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As a thank-you for reading, this chapter has a Bellarke sex scene. Also, I screwed up and had them checkout a day early, by the time I realised, it was too late. Sorry!

Sunday 1st April 

  
_Group Chat: Delinquents do a Wedding_

_Octavia Blake has changed the name of this group to Delinquents Did a Wedding_

_Harper McIntyre: Yeah, we did!!!_

_Raven Reyes: What’s with the past tense? Let’s keep this party going!_

_Jasper Jordan: I’m game!_

_Octavia Blake: I’m a professional dancer past twenty, if I don’t take the glass slippers off at midnight, I won’t be walking at all tomorrow._

_Lincoln Woods: Jasper Jordan, I see you typing a response, just remember, I can physically carry you into the forest and leave you there._

_Jasper Jordan: …_

_Jasper Jordan: Sleep well, dearest Octavia._

_Nate Miller: Zoe, Harper is in the hallway outside our rooms right now looking at photos of plants._

_Nate Miller: In case you were looking for her._

_Zoe Monroe: I can find a cache of drugs hidden in a farmhouse, but I can’t find my girlfriend when she wanders off drunk._

_Harper McIntyre: We need a plant baby!!!_

_Monty Green: Oooh, what kind?_

_Monty Green: Hang on, I’m coming to you_

_Nate Miller: Bye, I guess._

_Kyle Wick: So, the bartender just told me that the bar is out of champagne, sparkling wine, scotch, bourbon and imported beer. With Raven making a noticeable dent in the whisky but they’re starting to close up because some of the guests are getting too “rowdy”_

_Raven Reyes: What she actually said was “They’re being assholes and honestly, we’re not getting paid enough to keep serving them”_

_Raven Reyes: Also, she seemed really upset when she found out Clarke had a boyfriend, think you were her celebrity crush._

_Octavia Blake: The Hollywood Star and Nerd King do not currently exist._

_Octavia Blake: Please try again later_

_Harper McIntyre: Is it because they’re doing the sex?_

_Octavia Blake: The Hollywood Star and Nerd King do not currently exist._

_Octavia Blake: Please try again later_

_Jasper Jordan: I went past their room earlier, pretty sure they’re doing the sex_

_Octavia Blake: Lincoln, please drag Jasper into the woods and don’t stop until you find the gingerbread house._

_Lincoln Woods: Anything for you, ai niron._

_Harper McIntyre: Awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww._

* * *

 

Bellamy stood at the edge of the bed and reached down, wrapping his hands around Clarke’s ankles and dragging her towards him, the sheets bunching under her as she went with a breathy laugh.

Her body was flushed and sweaty, traces of make-up still on her face and her hair messy and crimped, with a few stray bobby pins having ended up on the one pillow that remained on the bed.

She was the most beautiful woman in the world to Bellamy Blake.

And he would have stood by that even if she hadn’t been the current title holder of the award confirming the exact same fact.

He bent down to kiss her lips, his chest brushing against her breasts and teasing her hardened nipples, a moan of delight issuing from her throat as she wrapped an arm around his neck that became a whimper of pure lust as his cock brushed against her folds.

She arched her hips and released him reluctantly when he straightened up, spreading her legs so he could step between them and he took his cock in hand, positioning himself before pushing in with gentle thrusts, easing into her slowly.   

They had snuck away from the wedding, hurrying back to their hotel room hand in hand, stealing kisses in the elevator, trading teasing promises that had been fulfilled the second they made it through the door and Bellamy’s free hand had delved under Clarke’s dress, pressing her against the wall as he worked her to a quick climax. When he was done, she’d unzipped the dress, and walked over to the couch, losing her lingerie as she went, and he didn’t need to be told to follow her. She’d perched on the coffee table, unbuckled his belt, unbuttoned his pants and left traces of her lipstick on his cock as she gave him an amazing blowjob, one he’d had to cut short, so she could drag him to the bed, push him down and climb on top. She self-deprecatingly called herself bossy but Bellamy had no complaints about her calling the shots in the bedroom.   
Besides, after a few orgasms, when she was sated and weak-kneed from pleasure, he could in her own words do ‘whatever the hell he wanted’ with her.   
  
Which he did now, making love to her with a slow but steady pace, their previous acts having left them sensitive and halfway to climax before they even began, Clarke palming her right breast and reaching down to play with her clit, her climax luxurious and he comes apart inside her in lazy bursts.

Gently he strokes her hair from her face and she kisses the side of his hand before reaching off the bed to grab the blanket that had been tossed overboard, along with their pillows and Bellamy’s tie.

“Good enough.” she states, when they’ve made the bed as haphazardly as possible while still being recognizable as a place of rest. He smirks and climbs up the mattress, flopping down with his head on her stomach and her hand cards his curls. They enjoy a few moments of peace before either of them notices the intermittent buzzing coming from one of the armchairs.

“We don’t need our phones,” he declares, too comfortable and warm to even consider moving, “Technology is too intrusive these days, we can leave them there.”

She hums in agreement, “Besides, if it’s an actual emergency, someone will come bang on our door.”

Thankfully, no-one did.

* * *

 

_Group chat: Delinquents Did a Wedding_

_Bellamy Blake: I know it’s 8am but in an hour, I need you to be out of bed._

_Bellamy Blake: I just checked the forecast and there’s a massive stormfront coming in._

_Bellamy Blake: The receptionist rang up and told us that if we aren’t off the mountain before it hits, we’ll be stuck here til it passes._

_Lincoln Woods: Yeah, these aren’t roads I want to navigate in a storm, how much time do we have?_

_Bellamy Blake: My app says it’ll start raining at midday._

_Lincoln Woods: So we should clear out at eleven?_

_Bellamy Blake: Yeah._

_Kyle Wick: Alternatively, you could leave some of us here to die._

_Bellamy Blake: If you want to fork out an extra half grand to stay another night, be my guest._

_Kyle Wick: …_

_Kyle Wick: As long as I don’t have to be sober or upright at eleven, I can be ready._

_Raven Reyes: Lol_

* * *

 

_Text Message_

_Your Mechanic: I won’t be able to drive until mid-afternoon._

_Booty Call #1: Still drunk?_

_Your Mechanic: Yes._

_Your Mechanic: And my leg is killing me._

_Booty Call #1: It’s fine._

_Booty Call #1: Clarke can drive auto, and manual, Lincoln and Octavia are both sober and Monroe once drove through woodlands while taking enemy fire and recovering from a gas attack, I’m sure she can manage a few hours hungover on a highway._

* * *

 

Bellamy spent ten minutes staring at his reflection in the mirror, trying to will himself to perform the necessary action before giving up and grabbing his glasses from the counter, pushing them up his nose and exhaling in pleasure when the world came into easy focus.

He had showered, dressed and was trying to convince himself that he felt like a human being, but it was difficult at that exact moment.

Especially in comparison to his girlfriend, who had woken up at seven, fetched their phones, charged them up and made herself a coffee before ducking into the bathroom and a short time later, emerging looking as if she hadn’t spent the half the night drinking enough champagne to have earned herself French citizenship.

Bellamy had managed to lift his head, tap uselessly at his phone and watch his naked girlfriend move about the room, so exhausted that even the sight of her amazing breasts didn’t elicit more than a tender tug on his heart strings.

Only the alert on his phone about the incoming storm had managed to defeat his inertia, and that was only because being trapped on a mountain during a storm was how people of color died in horror movies.

The part of him that loved his friends and makeshift family wanted to stop on their floor, go door to door, waking them up and making sure they got breakfast.

It was overruled by his stomach demanding _all_ the food and Clarke sent him ahead to the restaurant while she assigned herself the role of sergeant master. 

  
“I love you.” He’d blearily told her before abandoning her to the Herculean task, leaning his forehead against the wall until the elevator bell screamed to announce its arrival.

  
He managed to shuffle across reception, to the restaurant where he swallowed three times, reminded himself how English sentence structures worked and still nearly asked the waiter for a large table in Tagalog.

  
“There’ll be about eleven people coming down for breakfast.” he warned in a weak voice as the waiter led him to the same table they’d sat at yesterday, and he didn’t so much sit down as drop into the nearest chair.

  
“We have a buffet set up, we’ll bring a pot of coffee, juice and three pitchers of water.” The waiter promised, and Bellamy managed to twitch his lips upward in an attempt to smile.

  
A waitress comes over with a pot of coffee so quickly that Bellamy’s worried he’d had a micro-nap, but the restaurant is only at quarter capacity with most customers being families, and she gives off an air of efficiency and expertise until she lingers at the table.

  
“Will Clarissa Glacier be joining you?” she asks, and he feels some of the cobwebs in his mind blow away,

“That a problem?” he replies, and her eyes go wide as she shakes her head,

“No…just…uh…some of the staff…never mind.”

  
She hightails it out of there and he glowers at his plate, guilt burning his cheeks and making his stomach roil before he remembers that he needed to consume his body weight in carbs.

Octavia and Lincoln stride into the restaurant glowing with health and vitality and Bellamy hates them both in equal measure as they move around the buffet with the perfect choreography of a loving couple used to each other’s size and space. With two plates overflowing with fresh fruit and assorted superfood grains and seeds from across the world, they chatter excitedly about the morning hike they’d managed to fit in while Bellamy had lain face down on a pillow and wished for a long period of unconsciousness.

By the time Clarke has marched their friends down, the restaurant is filling up with fellow wedding guests doing zombie impersonations and Harper and Jasper plop down wearing matching dark sunglasses complemented by their pale and clammy skin.

She takes one look at the sorry mess of human beings in front of her and conscripts Lincoln and Octavia into helping her fetch plates of food for them.

Bellamy already knows that Jasper and Harper will poke at their food, trying to determine what they can risk of queasy stomachs, Monty will eat half of it before pushing it away suddenly and sipping on juice instead, Miller will eat slowly and almost silently, not speaking to anyone until he’s finished, Monroe will eat methodically, clearing her plate, positioning her cutlery and sitting straight-backed in the chair, Raven will throw back three glasses of juice before making herself a sandwich with whatever she had on hand that could feasibly go between two slices of bread.

When his predictions come true, he rewards himself with a tired grin and turns his attention to his girlfriend as she steals bacon off his plate.

  
“I think some of the staff are fans.” he tells her quietly and she smiles, shrugging helplessly.

  
The day had begun with a pale blue spring sky but looking outside now, he could see the dark clouds on the horizon and began to get twitchy, eager to leave.

His friends picked up on his anxiety and while they usually could take anywhere between twenty minutes and two solid hours to leave a restaurant or bar on a regular, pre-planned, generally quiet night for them, now, when he suggested it was time for them to go up to their rooms and pack, they all started getting to their feet.

  
“Checkout is at ten,” he reminds them, and they head out, led by Octavia and Lincoln who are probably already packed and ready to go. Clarke tugs on his hand, pulling him back and they linger at the bar until their waitress comes over,

“Was…everything okay?” she stammers nervously, and Clarke gives her a reassuring smile,

“My boyfriend told me I might have some fans back there,” she explains, nodding to the kitchen,

“I was hoping to say hi.”

  
She signs the back of three menus and a blank receipt roll, chatting pleasantly and answering some questions about her career and upcoming work while one of the waiters ducks out to get the reception attendants and Clarke gamely poses for a photo with them without any make-up on.

  
“If you could use all the filters and still photoshop that, I’d appreciate it,” she laughs,

“My agent will kill me otherwise.”

  
Bellamy volunteers for the role of photographer, generally staying out of the way while Clarke’s fans surround her and trying not to check the time or the rapidly approaching clouds, but she still catches his eye and must read the worry in his umber orbs.

  
“Sorry,” she apologizes, “We have to head home.”

  
Home.

He likes that.

* * *

 

Naturally, they’re the last to make it back to reception, his friends already in line waiting to checkout, their suitcases piled by the door while they stared down at their phones or glanced about impatiently.

Bellamy’s not sure what the hold-up is until he hears a very familiar voice.

Mrs Collins was positioned at the desk, arguing loudly with the manager about the incoming storm.

  
“We simply _must_ have our stay extended until it passes,” she announces, “We cannot be expected to drive home in _that_!”

  
She gestures to the large windows where the world was becoming drenched in sepia but was still completely devoid of rain.

  
“I’m sorry, ma’m,” the manager sighs, “But we simply can’t allow your entire wedding party to book rooms free of charge, anyone wishing to extend their stay can have a discount but will still have to pay for the night.”

  
The attendant that must have begun serving Mrs Collins tries to resume her duties only to be screeched at and forced to remain at her post, unable to help the rapidly growing line of customers.

Another attendant hurried towards the desk, still sipping a cup of tea and clearly cutting her break short to jump onto the desk and begin checking people out with efficiency over friendliness.

Bellamy signs his receipt to the soundtrack of Mrs Collins accusing the manager of wanting to kill the guests, that sending them out into the storm that had yet to happen was as good as blowing their brains out with a gun.

If it meant getting away from this woman faster, he would gladly pick up his suitcase and trek down the hill to the car park.

Except the shuttlebus was idling out the front of the hotel as the driver helped load suitcases into the hold and people crowded on, filling the seats and then the aisle, which was probably breaking a law or two, but the clouds on the horizon were black as pitch and thunder was rumbling ominously.

He and Clarke ended up on the stairs, leaning against each other as the driver made conversation, checking that they had a way home and were heading away from the storm, not towards it.

In the carpark, suitcases were unloaded hurriedly, people having to dart into the fray to grab their belongings before rushing to their cars. Bellamy ushered his group to the side as the bus roared back up the mountain and cars began peeling out of the parking lot, coming to sudden stops to prevent collisions and hitting the horn when someone wasn’t moving fast enough for everyone else’s liking.

With Lincoln driving, they had three cars and could split up a lot easier, but Bellamy still hovered at the driver’s side door, making sure Lincoln’s car- with his sister inside- was out of the parking lot with Monty and Miller safely ensconced, and that Monroe’s car, carrying Harper and Jasper, followed suit before climbing in.

Clarke had called shotgun, unnecessarily because she had girlfriend privileges before remembering Raven who had merely waved away her attempts to pass it off as a joke.

  
“Honestly, I prefer the backseat,” she explained, “I actually have more room.”

  
Clarke is clearly dubious until she sees Raven positioning herself sideways and resting her bad leg across the seats. She takes the front seat and pushed it forward so Raven would have more leg room if she sat up.

Everyone kept quiet as they drove at an almost ninety-degree angle down the mountain, Bellamy having to turn on the headlights when it became too dark to see, the trees above them rustling ominously as they blocked out the sky with their branches and thick leaves scattering on the road ahead of them. Once they hit the flat road that would take them to the highway, they all breathed sighs of relief and he turned on the radio, letting Wick lean between the seats to pick the music.

Clarke kicked off her shoes, tucked her feet under her and closed her eyes.

  
“You okay?” he asked quietly, taking his eyes off the road, and she gave him a tired smile,

“Happy to be heading home.”

 


	12. Delinquents Do Another Wedding

_Dear Bellamy,_ and co _._

_You are cordially invited to attend the wedding of_

_Abigail Griffin and Marcus Kane_

_On_

_August 19 th_

_At_

_12 pm_

_101 Phoenix Boulevard, Alpha, Arkadia._

 

July 2017

 

* * *

 

_Group Chat: Delinquents do another Wedding_

_Clarke Griffin has added Octavia Blake, Lincoln Woods, Harper McIntyre, Zoe Monroe, Maya Vie, Jasper Jordan, Monty Green and Nate Miller to this chat._

_Clarke Griffin has posted a picture to the chat._

_Clarke Griffin: Sorry about the lack of personalized invitations._

_Clarke Griffin: Kane and my mom just figured it’d be easier to invite you over social media than print off and send invitations to several different addresses._

_Clarke Griffin: Actually, his first question was ‘Does your generation even have letterboxes Clarke?’_

_Monty Green: … That’s a pretty valid question_

_Monty Green: We don’t have landlines, I wonder if letterboxes will become redundant as well?_

_Monty Green: We still get packages delivered but that’s to our doors! Not left in letterboxes. So, will we just all get slots in our doors and then everything will eventually be delivered by drones?_

_Nate Miller: For the sake of clarity, Monty and Jasper hotboxed their living room and are so bug eyed I’m getting high just watching them from the balcony._

_Lincoln Woods: What’s the dress code?_

_Clarke Griffin: A lot more relaxed than the last wedding. Semi-formal but no judgement either way._

_Octavia Blake: Sweet._

_Octavia Blake: And the driving sit?_

_Clarke Griffin: They suggested blow up mattress and crashing in my room if you want but it’s so close we could probably just taxi to and from Bellamy’s place._

_Clarke Griffin: Unless you want to be designated driver @Bellamy?_

_Clarke Griffin: @Bellamy_

_Clarke Griffin: Why isn’t this tagging?_

_Clarke Griffin: Oh right, I should probably add the one person in this chat who actually got an invitation._

_Clarke Griffin has added Bellamy Blake to this chat._

_Bellamy Blake: What is this? I thought we deleted this chat after the wedding._

_Bellamy Blake: Is this a different group?_

_Octavia Blake: You are such an idiot!_

_Bellamy Blake: Hey @Lincoln, want to see some photos of pre-teen Octavia?_

_Octavia Blake: DON’T YOU DARE!!!!!!!!!!_

_Lincoln Woods: @Bellamy, I’ll be at your house in ten minutes._

_Raven Reyes: @Lincoln, why aren’t you at work right now?_

_Lincoln Woods: I am, that’s why it’ll take ten minutes and not five._

_Octavia Blake: I AM NEVER HAVING SEX WITH YOU AGAIN!_

_Lincoln Woods: As long as we’re still together, I do not care._

_Harper McIntyre: Awww, true love guys!_

_Octavia Blake: I am going to kill everyone in this chat!_

_Clarke Griffin: Okay but do it after the wedding? Bellamy is in the wedding party and mourning black really washes my mom out._

_Jasper Jordan: Do you guys think man is inherently good?_

_Monty Green: I’d like to give Earth a giant hug_

_Nate Miller: Yeah…I’m confiscating my boyfriend’s phone and locking Jasper in his bedroom_

_Nate Miller: Do we need to RSVP to this thing?_

_Clarke Griffin: I’ve already put everyone down as a yes, but if that changes, let me know._

_Maya Vie: Hey, sorry everyone, my phone was off but I’m here now and._

_Maya Vie: Wow…_

_Maya Vie: So…is there a wedding registry?_

_Zoe Monroe: Girl adapts fast._

* * *

“Alright,” Bellamy called out, making sure his voice reached all rooms of his apartment,

“We’re leaving in twenty minutes, either you’re in my car, Lincoln’s car or left behind, those are your options.”

Octavia huffs in annoyance as she pads out of his kitchen, her feet bare and her heels in her hands.

“Jerk.”

He sticks his tongue out at her and then does a sweep of the room to judge the likelihood of his friends being ready in twenty minutes.

Raven was sprawled out on the couch, on her tablet working on a problem which she swore was just everyday engineering stuff, but he was pretty certain that she was actually trying to keep a rocket on the way to the International Space Station from falling out of the sky.

Maya and Lincoln were watering Bellamy’s growing assortment of house plants that stayed alive despite his lack of interest and, both of them, being low maintenance, were already dressed and good to go.

Monty, Miller and Jasper had discovered a new video game halfway through getting dressed and barely had one suit on between the three of them, he stuck his head into his bathroom, found them all staring at their game devices and wanted to try and confiscate them, but his forearm still hurt from the time he’d tried to take Jasper’s phone during dinner and the twenty-one year old man had sunk his teeth into him.

“I will leave without you three,” he warns, “I’m not going to be late, I’m best man…and there’s an open bar.”

“There’s an open bar?” Harper asks, coming up behind him and stepping over Jasper’s legs to reach the mirror, opening her mouth as she began applying mascara,

“Have you met Clarke?” he jokes, “That’s not a girl who comes from a teetotal lifestyle. She would have boycotted this wedding if there wasn’t an open bar.”

And Bellamy wants to pretend that the promise of free alcohol is not the reason his friends get downstairs to the cars with two minutes to spare, that perhaps it’s their love of Clarke...

But he doesn’t want to start down the dangerous path of denying reality.

* * *

 

“Holy Crap,” Jasper hisses when he pulls his car to the curb, “Is _that_ where Clarke lives?!”

Technically, it would be more accurate to say that Clarke lived in Bellamy’s apartment, because her possessions had been making a pretty steady migration over the last few months.

But he remembered how he’d felt the first time Kane had invited him over.

The poor, uncouth outsider who could be exposed at any second and ordered back to his as-yet-ungentrified neighbourhood.

It had taken a few visits before the feeling went away, but he could never get over just how picturesque the 1928 Georgian Revival house was, or how big.

He orders his friends out of the car and strides across the street, looking down at his phone as he walks, texting Clarke and the bright flash startles him, nearly causing him to drop his phone.

He turns his face away automatically, blinking rapidly to adjust.

This wasn’t the first-time paparazzi had surprised him.

News of his and Clarke’s relationship had been broken by TMZ with several photos of them together during the wedding plastered across the site and then many, many more across social media. Miller had remarked that there were more photos of the two of them at the wedding then there was of the bride and groom.

Thankfully he didn’t really exist on social media, he had a private Facebook account and twitter only to share articles with his students and retweet his professors, but still, every possible piece of information available online had been mined by gossip rags and a profile on him hastily constructed.

He’d had to have an awkward conversation with his boss at Arkadia Museum on the Tuesday morning when a paparazzi had come in and tried to photograph him at work, and some of his students had taken pictures of him during class and posted videos of him lecturing online but for the most part, interest in him had died down pretty quickly.

It helped that he and Clarke were ‘the boring-est couple to ever couple’ according to Octavia.

Still, he supposed even he and Clarke would merit some attention at a wedding.

He ushers his friends inside the gate to the courtyard where guests are milling about, a range of drinks in hand as they chatted, waving to each other, laughing and setting the atmosphere. He heads inside and takes out his phone.

* * *

_Text Message_

_History Nerd: Marco_

* * *

_“Polo!”_

He follows Clarke’s call to the living room where he finds her standing looking down at a coffee table with dismay. She barely raises her head to greet him and he kisses her bare shoulder before he spots Abby and Kane.

Both of them were dressed, Kane in a grey morning suit without a tie and Abby in a sleeveless white gown with a sheer pop over bodice, that fell to her ankles with a slit in her skirt. Her hair was tied back in a fishtail braid with a periwinkle blue ribbon.

They both looked ready to get married, even if they weren’t wearing their shoes, so Bellamy didn’t immediately pick up on the reason Clarke was concerned, until he saw what it was exactly the engaged couple was doing.

Playing a game of Monopoly.

“Little late to call off the wedding.” he points out and Kane chuckles,

“Charles bought it for us as a gift.” He explains, rolling the dice and moving his car accordingly,

“We thought it would be a test of true love,” Abby continues, “If we can make it an hour without breaking up, our marriage might just last.”

Bellamy personally didn’t want to test his own relationship with Clarke via Monopoly, because he’d once heard her threaten to brain Lincoln when he’d beaten her at a game of checkers.

He’d had to have a stern word with Anya about why she was allowing her star to take a sledge hammer off movie sets.

He slips an arm around her waist now, leading her through the kitchen where bottles of champagne are already being opened, out to the backyard where he found Monty and Jasper under a flower arch as Octavia officiated their wedding.

“Please tell me your sister isn’t actually certified as an officiant,” Miller begs, coming up behind them with a cup of coffee, fresh from the machine,

“Because I don’t sleep with married men.”

Bellamy is pretty sure that most college graduates were ordained, it was fast, easy and a fun way to procrastinate when exams were coming up.

“I have never slept with a married man before,” Maya interjects into the conversation, “Never thought I would but if it’s Jasper, might as well get the experience.”

Bellamy is familiar enough with his sister’s speech pattern and wedding ceremonies to piece together what she’s saying by the rise and fall of her voice, even if they’re not close enough to make out the words and Monty and Jasper share a quick cheek kiss seconds later.

“I think…it’s not legally binding unless there’s a licence signed?” Clarke offers, “I’m not sure, but one of the things our agents tell us is not to get drunk impulse married, or if we do, not to sign anything.”

“Well, it’s being tweeted and instagrammed, so it’s probably official,” Bellamy jokes,

“Here’s hoping your mom’s marriage last longer than theirs will.”

The wedding was set to begin at twelve but even though most of the guests found their seats in time, a few were still mingling around, chatting and Kane was stopped half a dozen times on his way up the aisle, Bellamy standing there chuckling as he finally got there.

He was pretty sure that Clarke and her mom were pre-gaming in the kitchen, but Lincoln’s camera was forward facing so he wasn’t concerned.

The officiant was a long-time friend of Kane’s, Indra, who was also Lincoln’s aunt and there had been a moment of surprise when they’d encountered one another.

Abby appears in the doorway a moment before the music starts playing but she’s smiling as she and Clarke walk down the aisle, the two of them out of step with the song, giggling and smirking.

Kane is beaming as he takes Abby’s hand and holds an arm out behind Clarke, as if worried she was going to fall backwards down the non-existent steps.

Indra quirks a perfect eyebrow and waits until the wedding party is managing to face her,

“We are here today…”

* * *

 

There is no clear demarcation between the ceremony and the reception, one moment Abby and Kane are kissing and the next, everyone is wandering about, drinking and nibbling on the finger food.

Abby’s shoes come off right away and Kane’s jacket ends up draped over Harper’s shoulders even though Bellamy only took his eyes of the newly weds for a second.

Clarke comes out of the house with a bundle in her arms and he has a moment where he’s wondering if she’s smuggling in booze to her own mother’s wedding before recognising a heap of picnic blankets.

She sets aside two for their group by the pool and he already knows one of his delinquents is going to end up in the water at some point.

But enough of Abby’s friends are doctors that it shouldn’t be a problem.

The day is pleasantly warm and sunny, he tilts his head back, enjoying the gentle breeze and the sounds of celebration around him.

Clarke kneels beside him, trying to figure out how to best move in her tight dress and he pulls off his jacket immediately, draping it over her thighs so she could maintain a level of decency.

Their friends come and go from the blanket, dropping their possessions, touching base and wandering off again to mingle. Abby and Kane come over for a round of introductions and the bride leaves a bottle of flavoured vodka she’d picked up in a self-confessed mid-life-crisis.

“Your mom rocks.” Raven declares, twisting the cap and pouring Octavia a shot,

“Second that.” Zoe echoes as she helps herself.

“A toast,” Monty suggests, raising the bottle, “To a wedding that doesn’t cost the guests a bunch of money, that doesn’t eat into our vacation days, that doesn’t involve petty Facebook posts or rude, entitled assholes.” He pauses while they murmur agreement, before turning to Octavia with a cheeky grin on his face,

“May all our future weddings be this much fun.”

Lincoln ducks his head in amusement while Bellamy’s sister glowers, but he’s never known her to turn down a chance to drink, so she does her shot, but he would bet money that she would be kicking Monty into the pool later.

Bellamy planned to be far away when that happened, possibly upstairs in Clarke’s bedroom, he whispers as much in her ear and she chuckles,

“And here I was planning on catching the bouquet.”

He blinks in surprise, but her smile is light-hearted, teasing with just a hint of seriousness, and a warm feeling settles in his chest.

“I think we can make that happen.”

* * *

 

_Group Chat: Delinquents do Another Wedding_

_Octavia Blake: Oh my God Clarke! It’s your mother’s wedding and you snuck off with your boyfriend?!_

_Maya Vie: Are you actually surprised?_

_Maya Vie: You saw how they looked at each other when she caught the bouquet._

_Maya Vie: I’ve never seen two people so in love_

_Maya Vie: Except for @Jasper and @Monty_

_Jasper Jordan: Obviously_

_Nate Miller: Float you all to hell_

_Zoe Monroe: Bellamy I get, but how is your phone still auto-correcting swear words @Miller?_

_Lincoln Woods: Don’t worry, they aren’t upstairs._

_Lincoln Woods: I have photographic proof_

_Octavia Blake: …_

_Octavia Blake: …_

_Octavia Blake: So…if it looks like I’m changing my Facebook status to single, it’s because I am._

_Lincoln Woods has uploaded a photo to this group._

_Octavia Blake has left this group._

_Raven Reyes, Maya Vie, Jasper Jordan, Monty Green, Harper McIntyre, Zoe Monroe and Nate Miller have viewed this photo._

_Nate Miller has added Octavia Blake to this group._

_Nate Miller: Don’t worry @Octavia, it’s safe to look._

_Raven Reyes: That’s nerdishly adorable._

_Raven Reyes: What are they playing?_

_Lincoln Woods: Monopoly_

_Octavia Blake: I can’t believe I’m saying this but I’d almost rather they be having sex._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading everyone, I had a lot of fun writing this and a lot of ideas for a possible sequel.


End file.
